Skeletons
by dabbling
Summary: We all have skeletons in the closet, no matter how good we are. Bobby & Alex have theirs, too. Crime story with a good dose of BA drama thrown in.
1. Chapter 1

Skeletons

Chapter 1

Goren and Eames stood in front of the excavated body, a skeleton in clothing that had been uncovered by renovators earlier in the day. A forensic team had carefully removed the dirt surrounding the body, working as carefully as archaeologists, with brushes, reverently bringing the body back to the light of day.

"Advanced decomp," Goren muttered.

_Well, duh,_ Eames thought. While some of the clothing was still intact, the skeleton appeared to have little to no meat on it. "Female," Alex said.

Bobby turned to her in surprise.

"I know the label on the shirt. Adella, fine women's clothing." She bent down and with her gloved hands turned the fabric slightly, revealing the entire logo. He nodded appreciatively.

One of the local detectives was hanging close by. Bobby waved him over. "So what's the story?"

"The owners were going to expand the basement, big plans for a party room, bar, you know, the works. Anyway, they cut through this section of the wall and found out somebody'd had the idea before. This section was already part way dug out, then had been closed up again."

"I wonder who she was," Alex said. She looked around at the dirt that was still up to her shoulders in some places. "I wonder how long she's been buried here."

* * *

"The Trents just bought the house last summer. Prior to that, it was owned a year by Brent Charles, and it sat vacant the last two months before the Trents bought it. Prior to Charles, it was owned and occupied for 6 years by Clay Tungstall."

"THE Clay Tungstall?"

"Eames. Really. How many people could there possibly be with that name?"

She smiled at his humor and picked up her phone. After a moment's conversation, she hung up and said. "That was Rodgers. She's ready for us."

* * *

"Female, approximately 35 years old. She's given birth at least once. I'd say she's been dead between three and five years."

Bobby and Alex shared a knowing glance. "Cause of death?" Bobby asked.

"Not much to go on," Rodgers said. "But I did find a nick on her C7."

Alex gave her a confused look. "C7?"

"Cervical vertebrae." To illustrate, Rodgers ran her finger across her gullet. Both detectives nodded with comprehension. "Two digits on her left hand were broken, as well, the pinkie and the ring finger."

"Her clothes?" Alex asked.

"Trace picked them up an hour ago, what was left of them."

"Anything identifying?"

"Checking dental records."

They thanked the doctor and headed back to the squad room. Alex stopped by the elevator doors and told Bobby, "I'm going to check in with trace. Maybe you can find out what Senator Tungstall was doing to his basement three to five years ago."

* * *

They turned the corpse over to an artist for facial reconstruction, in the event they couldn't identify her otherwise. With the help of the CSU crew in trace, Alex was able to identify the clothing and find them in catalogs. They were pricy: designer wear.

In the meantime, Bobby had secured an appointment for them with former state Senator Clay Tungstall first thing the next morning. They still hadn't heard about the dental records. There was nothing more to do but call it a night.

Alex knew she wouldn't make her usual jog in the morning, so she decided to end her night with a jog instead. She burst into the apartment, covered in sweat and breathing hard. She tossed her keys down, helped herself to a bottle of water, and hit the shower.

Bobby arrived at his dark and quiet apartment well after dinner. He'd eaten at Luchese's again, chicken alfredo for the third time this week. He emptied his pockets and pulled a bottle down from the cabinet. He poured himself a drink, and sat down to sort through his mail. It occurred to him that Alex might go for a run. He worried about her when she ran at night, not because she couldn't take care of herself, but because he knew the city. He knew of too many victims who had simply met with the improbable. He picked up his phone and called her.

"Hello?" Alex answered in a sing-song voice.

"Did you run?"

"Yeah. Already finished. It's starting to get a little chilly at night," she added.

"Yeah," he grinned. "I noticed that, too."

"I guess I'll have to wear my jacket tomorrow."

"Maybe so." He switched the phone to his other ear. "Uh, Eames, I… I'll see you in the morning."

"Good night, Bobby." She hung up, and finished preparing herself for bed. As she stretched out beneath the sheets, she smiled, knowing he had only called to check in on her.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

The estate of Clayton Tungstall was impressive. Situated in the Hamptons, his home was at the end of a long private drive that wound up to the top of a hill. The lawn was rich grass, still as green as it was in spring. After identifying themselves at the gate, it buzzed and swung open slowly. Alex coaxed the SUV up the drive at a careful pace and parked in the loop near the front door.

They piled out and Bobby led the way to the front door. He was already jittery, she could tell by the bounce in his step. Bobby rang the bell and before he could turn to look at her, the door opened.

"Welcome, detectives," the butler said. "Mr. Tungstall is waiting for you." He led the way into a sitting room.

Bobby busied himself studying the trinkets adorning the room, while Alex looked out the window at the view across the lawn. "You can't even see the neighbors," she commented.

"If you knew them, you wouldn't want to see them, either," Tungstall said as he walked in with a smile. Alex and Bobby smiled and shook his hand, making their introductions. "You said something had happened at my old house?" he asked.

Alex nodded. "The new owners were renovating the basement, and they found a portion that had been started on once before."

Tungstall sighed and wiped his hand over his face. "Ah, yes. What a disaster! We were going to expand the basement, but the legislature was in session, and I'm afraid without me there on a regular basis, my wife was unable to keep the contractors in line. The house was torn up for a solid month before her health took a turn and I called the whole project to a halt."

"Contractors," Bobby said, with a smile and a nod. "They were… dragging things out?"

"Oh yes. You know, earning that hourly wage."

"Mr. Tungstall, a body was found in that basement."

He froze in place and sank down onto the sofa. "Oh my God."

"A female, we haven't been able to identify her yet."

"Do you believe one of the workmen…?" he swallowed hard, and Alex and Bobby shared a glance.

Alex's mouth twisted into a wry smile. "She was a little out of their league, Mr. Tungstall."

His eyes widened. "You can't think that I…?!"

Alex shook her head. "We don't think anything yet, Mr. Tungstall. We're just trying to find something that will explain who she was, and how she ended up there."

"When exactly did you have the work done on the basement?" Bobby asked.

"It was in the fall of… 2006. September, I think. About this time of year."

Bobby opened his binder and made a note of that information. "Do you… still have paperwork on the job? Receipts, blueprints, anything?"

"Most likely," the man answered. "It will take me a while to find it. You know, we left that house, and none of that seemed to matter anymore."

"The victim was approximately 35 years old," Alex said. "She wore designer clothing. Can you think of anyone who may have been in your home back then who fits that description?"

He shook his head. "It's not much of a description. My wife, most of her friends, some of the servants."

"Your servants wore designer clothes?" Alex was surprised.

"My wife isn't much for uniforms. She insisted they look presentable to guests."

"Is your wife home, Mr. Tungstall?" Bobby asked.

He looked down in shame. "Uhm… no, detective. We… we've been separated for the last year."

"I'm sorry to hear that," Bobby said. "Issues with… fidelity?" He pressed.

After a moment, the man nodded. "Being in the senate didn't help our marriage any. We both developed some bad… habits."

The detectives wrapped up the interview and were shown to the door by the manservant. Before the door closed behind him, Bobby stuck his foot in the way and popped his head back inside from the porch. The servant paused. "Uhm, did you… did you work for Mr. Tungstall back in 2006?"

He nodded.

"You don't like designer suits?" Bobby asked.

The man stared at him, obviously not understanding the purpose of the question.

"N-never mind, forget about it," Bobby said. He walked out the door and got in the car, where his partner was waiting for him. Bobby glanced over at her. "That whole 'my wife insists on the servants wearing designer clothes' thing? It's a crock," he said.

Alex nodded. "I figured as much."


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

"Dentals turned up nothing?" Captain Hannah asked.

"Illegal immigrant," Bobby said.

"Call girl?" Alex tossed the idea out, and both Bobby and the Captain were agreeable.

Her phone rang. "Eames," she said. After a moment, she hung up. "That was Priscilla, downstairs. We got a courier delivery from Tungstall," she said.

At a nod from the Captain, the two hurried to the elevators. "Big business, foreign call girls?" Bobby asked her.

"Oh yeah. Mostly Asian, but there are services who have quite the diverse menu. You know, a guy gets off on a certain kind of accent, or a certain skin color or hair color." Alex's mind drifted easily back to her days in Vice. "I went undercover once…" her voice trailed away.

"In Vice?" Bobby asked her.

She nodded.

"Y-you didn't… uh…" he stopped, ashamed he'd even begun to ask the question. Alex said nothing, and they were both saved by the opening of the elevator doors. They headed straight to Priscilla's desk.

"Detectives!" She said cheerfully. "I missed you at the picnic," she said. Priscilla, in addition to her reception duties for all of 1PP, was the founder and chair of the morale committee. Four times a year, the employees of 1PP were treated to huge parties, complete with friendly competition, live music, and a massive buffet.

"Maybe next year," Bobby said with a wink.

"I'll hold you to that, Goren," she said firmly.

Alex held her hands up. "I had family obligations this time. I would have loved to take on Corelli in the sack race again."

A vision of Alex holding a burlap sack up past her waist, hopping, her breasts bouncing freely, assaulted Bobby's mind and brought a huge smile to his face.

"Next year," Bobby said. "Both of us will be there." Alex shot him a questioning look, but grinned and let it go.

"What do you have for us, Priscilla?" Alex asked.

She handed over the large manila envelope. "I didn't know you were friends with the Senator," she said.

"Former Senator," Alex corrected. "And we just met him this morning."

* * *

Later that afternoon they were in the offices of Manchester Construction. David Manchester invited them into his private office and shook their hands.

"Mr. Manchester, you did some work for Senator Tungstall back in 2006?"

"God, what an asshole," Manchester said. Glancing at Alex, he added, "Sorry." He sat down at his desk, motioning for them to sit down as well. Alex did, Bobby didn't. "His wife called us about expanding his basement, and we went out there and started working the job. Well, that house was a mess. It took twice as long as we had figured to do the digging, because we had to keep shoring up the place. And then it seemed like everyplace that would have been ideal to set a brace was full of plumbing or wiring. A real mess."

"He felt like you guys were… dragging your feet," Bobby said, turning away from a bookshelf to look back at the contractor.

"He was an ass about it. He chewed me out, he chewed my men out. He even chewed his wife out. I guess he was supposed to host some big party, and he forgot to tell her about it, and then with the house under construction like that, it screwed up his plans. Honestly, I was glad when the guy fired us."

"He fired you?"

"Oh, yeah. He fired us and hired West Hill to close it up."

"He mentioned something," Alex began, "about his wife's health taking a turn?"

"She was hospitalized. That's why he came back to the house and got involved in the first place. She was in the hospital a week, and then when she came home he hung around and made us all miserable. She couldn't convince him to continue with the project, and he fired us." Manchester looked over at the detectives. "I never had any problem with her, she was a nice lady."

* * *

"I never used my body to do the job," Alex said as they inched back through the evening rush towards 1PP.

This was completely off topic, but Bobby knew immediately what she was referring to. "I'm sorry about that, I didn't mean to imply that you would," he said, and turned a little red.

"No," she explained. "It's a fair question, especially when you think about being undercover as a call girl."

Of course he wanted to know more, but Bobby didn't ask. This was way too personal, and he didn't want to pry.

"We'd hit the regular haunts with the Johns, then feed them some line about a free suite at a five-star, and that's where we'd either bust them or turn them."

"You were… with Joe back then."

"Yeah."

"Must have been hard on your relationship."

"It was hard on our _marriage_," she corrected. "But Joe was a cop, and he knew…"

Alex didn't say anything more, but Bobby noticed how deeply distracted she was. He assumed it was Joe that was on her mind.

* * *

Alex headed home and as she cooked her dinner, she couldn't help replaying the nightmare in her mind.

_ Walking, flirting, hanging on his arm. At the entrance to the hotel, he'd said something about his car, and like an idiot she'd gone with him. She thought her team would realize and track her wherever she went with him._

_ At the car, he'd kissed her hard, turned her, and bent her over the trunk forcefully. Even with all her training, Alex wasn't able to push him away. She just wasn't strong enough. Without blowing her cover, she'd silently cried as she felt him tear off her stockings and shove his way inside._

_ That was the end of the undercover job. Joe met her at the hospital and she was so ashamed she couldn't even look at him. Thank God she'd been on the pill._

_It was some relief to hear that he'd been arrested, even more when he was found guilty and sent to Rikers. But it was something that had permanently scarred her. It had nearly destroyed her life with Joe. Things had just gotten back on track when he was killed. And it was something that had kept her from new relationships now._

_ She'd spoken to Olivet about it, after the incident with Jo Gage. Olivet had helped, but she'd been honest, too. Scars don't go away. People find a way to see past them, to work around them, but they never disappear. She'd said Alex needed to learn to be okay with taking it slow. If she found a man, it was important he be okay with that, too._


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

The knock at the door caught her by surprise. Alex closed the dishwasher and started it, then rinsed her hands. She wiped them dry on a towel as she walked to her door. A peek through the peephole confirmed it was Bobby.

Alex pulled open the door. "What are you doing here?" She asked pleasantly.

He brought a bag in with him and shrugged. "I picked up dessert at the Bread Wheel." Bobby's smile warmed her heart. "I thought maybe you'd share it with me."

Alex grinned and her eyes drifted toward the paper sack. "That depends on what it is."

Bobby walked in and set the bag on her kitchen table. "Yeah, you'll probably hate it. Something called 'Death by Chocolate.' " He winked, and she grabbed forks and brought them to the table while he pulled two carry out boxes out of the bag.

She already had a bite in her mouth and was moaning with delight by the time he sat down. Bobby smiled, pleased that he could make her happy. "You're too sweet, Bobby," she told him.

"You seemed a little… melancholy when you dropped me off." He ate a bite of the sweet concoction and continued. "I don't like to see you that way."

She swallowed and then said, "That makes two of us."

"You're all right?" He asked, and gently dropped a hand over hers.

She nodded. "I am now."

* * *

As Bobby walked from the subway to his place, he didn't even notice the chill in the air. He didn't stay long with Eames, but it was long enough. He could still feel the tingle in his lips. She allowed him to kiss her goodbye.

It had been a long time since Bobby had kissed anyone. He hadn't been in a relationship since before his mother died. As he'd gotten older, he'd lost interest even in one night stands. He hadn't lost his drive; he'd just gotten a lot pickier about who he wanted to be with.

And that someone he wanted, for several years now, had been Alex Eames. He spent his days with her, working, and he pined for her company every night. He simply couldn't get enough of her.

Their relationship was already beyond a simple crush. They'd been friends for years. They'd been through hell and back, together. A few years back, they'd gone their separate ways. Bobby had gone to work with the FBI and Alex had hired on with a big investigations agency. That had been the second worst year of his life.

When he'd come back to NYPD, it was on condition he could partner with Alex. He didn't know she'd made the same demand regarding him. Hannah knew Bobby, but he was still getting to know Alex. Eager to be successful as Captain of Major Case, he fought to get Bobby back.

A condition of his re-employment was counseling with Dr. Paula Gyson. He'd completed his mandatory sessions and then continued with her for a year. She was the reason he could now admit that he was in love with Alex. He'd suppressed the emotion, even the thought, for years.

Now, Bobby was honest with himself. He knew what he wanted, and slowly, he was letting Alex in on the secret.

He fumbled with his keys at his apartment door, still smiling with the knowledge that Alex returned his kiss. It looked like finally, after all these years, he had a chance at real happiness.

* * *

"They're going to bust my ass for using the color printer so much," Alex said as she brought in a stack of photographs she'd dredged up from the internet.

Bobby grinned and watched her hang them on the bulletin board. The interview room was small, but well lit, and had everything they needed to lay out the facts of a case: bulletin board, white board, table.

"Tungstall in 2006, at one party after another. Politics must be a lot of fun," she snarked.

Bobby was already working on identifying the women in the pictures, circling them and writing names beside each one. As Alex tacked up the last picture, he made a list on the board of the names he already knew. "Did you… uh… print two of each?" He asked Alex.

She grinned and handed him a new stack of photographs. "I'm gonna get a bill for the ink, I'm telling you," she joked.

He sat down and made a mark next to each woman they had yet to identify. "I'm gonna… uh… make another appointment with Tungstall."

"I'll make one with his wife," Alex said.

* * *

Deborah Tungstall was living in a modest home in Queens. She welcomed the detectives and invited them to sit down. "It's my sister's place," she explained. "I've been staying with her since the separation."

"That's nice of her," Alex said. "Kind of hard to have a live-in guest for so long. Even family."

"Especially family, don't you mean?" Tungstall shook her head. "She's been wonderful. I help out, when I'm well, with the kids and the housekeeping, and she helps me when I'm not well."

"You have a chronic illness?" Bobby asked.

She nodded. "I have chronic pancreatitis. If I get sick, I have to go to the hospital, usually for about 5 days at a time. I've had it off and on since I was 30. I'm getting better at recognizing the symptoms now."

"You had an attack back in 2006, when you were having the work done on your basement?" Alex asked.

"Yes. Clay was so upset that he had to leave a legislative session to come be with me. And then he was even more upset when he saw what I'd done to the house."

"He seems rather… controlling," Bobby said.

She chuckled. "He likes things the way he likes them. Not good for a marriage, but it seems to work well in politics."

"We wanted to ask you about some of the women in these photographs," Alex said, nodding to Bobby, who extracted them from his binder.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

They sat together, quietly talking over nearly empty plates at lunch. The conversation had turned from the case to silence-filling piffle, to hinting at things more personal. Bobby's eyes were soft and curious.

Alex was friendly, but guarded.

"I've been… doing a lot of thinking… about us, about our friendship, Alex."

She bit her bottom lip and noticed again the gentleness in his eyes.

His knee started to bounce, and for a moment, she thought he wouldn't continue, would just bury this conversation in the dark room inside him where so many others had come to an end. But Bobby surprised her by continuing. "I don't have anyone, like you… No one else has stood by me like you have, no one else can… make me wake up and listen when I get all… caught up in my own head."

"Not even Lewis?" She asked, hoping to lighten the mood.

He shook his head seriously. "Not even Lewis." Bobby reached out and took her hand from beside her fork. "I love you, Alex. I want to love you."

Alex smiled, and blushed, and shifted nervously, trying to pull her hand away, then changing her mind and holding it closer to him. "Bobby… I… I want more, too, but… I'm not sure if I can."

"Because of Joe?" He asked, an honest question. Bobby had watched her go through periods of dating over the years, and he had noticed none of them ever matured into a relationship.

Alex shrugged, almost nodded, and then looked up with worried eyes. "Because of me?"

He gave her hand a squeeze, but he had no idea why she would feel that way. "Last night, when… when I kissed you," he started, but she interrupted.

"I kissed you, too." She squeezed his hand with hers. "I love you, Bobby. I do. You've been my best friend for so long, I can't even imagine…"

She saw him relax a little, and the smile returned to his lips.

"I… I guess I just need to take this slow."

Bobby's fingers gently massaged her hand. "Slow is good," he said.

She stared into his eyes, not sure he really meant it. "There are things you don't know about me," she warned. "Even after all this time."

"There's nothing I could learn that would make me love you any less," he promised. "But there are a few… skeletons in my closet, too."

"Slow, then," Alex repeated.

"Slow," Bobby promised.

* * *

"Thank you for seeing us again, Mr. Tungstall," Alex said as she and Bobby shook his hand again. They were in the same room as the day before, and the butler, though still in a suit, was not wearing a designer one.

"You received the paperwork I sent?"

Bobby nodded. "Yes sir, thank you. I guess you couldn't find the receipts from West Hill Construction, though?"

Tungstall blanched. "N-no. I completely forgot about those. I'll send them as soon as I can," he promised.

Bobby smiled. "You do that."

Alex sat down on the sofa with her handful of photographs. "We were hoping you could identify some people in these photographs, Mr. Tungstall."

He sat down beside her, a little more at ease due to her comforting tone. He took the first picture from her hand and studied it closely. "This is my wife, that's Erin Durbin, and this is…" he looked away, trying to recall the woman's name. "Selena? I think her name was Selena Archuleta." Alex handed him photograph after photograph, and he identified as many women as he could.

"Mr. Tungstall," Bobby asked, "Perhaps you have some snapshots from these same parties?"

"Oh, sure," he said. "I'm sure I do. Deborah was committed to documenting my political career. Something to show the… grandkids, you know."

"Did you and Deborah have children?" Alex asked with interest.

"Oh, no. Just… broken dreams, you know."

"You'll send us the snapshots, then?" Bobby asked with a smile. "It would really help us."

* * *

After filling in the Captain, the two left for the evening. "Uh, did you want to… come over later?" Bobby asked her. "Or I could pick you up… we could… catch a movie."

"I'm not much for movies these days," Alex said. "Maybe something else? I hear there's a shooting club on 78th."

Bobby grinned. "You're not comfortable on a date with me unless you have a gun in your hand?" he teased.

"It was just a thought."

"I'll pick you up at 7."

* * *

Bobby did quite well, but in the end, Alex scored a few more hits than he did. For the fun of it, they didn't use their service weapons, but each tried out something different. Alex filled out a small scorecard and waved it in front of his face, taunting him as they walked back to his place from the subway line.

"I guess it's a good thing you always do the talking," she said.

He was a good sport and took her ribbing with a smile. "I guess."

She followed him up the stairs to his apartment, where he let her inside and shut the door. "You like bourbon. I got some Jim Beam for you."

"Sounds great," she said. She flopped comfortably on his couch and waited for him to bring in their drinks. He handed her a glass and sat down beside her with his own. They took a drink. "It seems kind of stupid, doesn't it?" she asked.

"What?"

"That after all these years, I should demand that we take it slow."

Bobby shrugged one shoulder. "I find courting romantic. And I look forward to learning more about you, one small reveal at a time."

She gave him a genuine smile and set her drink on the coffee table. "You know what I like about you?"

He set his drink down, too. "What?"

"No matter how well I know you, you always manage to surprise me." She saw the tiny smile on his lips, and her heart turned a somersault. "You know what else I like?"

"No." He sat very still while she scooted in closer to him. He felt her finger trace along his five o'clock shadow, already reappearing even though he shaved again after work.

"I like when you have these whiskers," she whispered and her mouth closed on his jaw.

With two more kisses along his jawline, she had reached his mouth. Bobby timidly pressed his mouth against hers, and felt the same tingle he'd felt the night before. This time, he pressed a little further, tasted her lips with his tongue.

She tasted like whiskey. He broke the kiss and pressed his forehead against hers. They didn't speak, but each felt the waves of emotion pouring off the other. Alex arched her neck and her lips found his again.


	6. Chapter 6

A/N Thanks to everyone for the reviews! I love to hear what readers are thinking!

* * *

Chapter 6

Alex woke in the morning with a hangover and a crick in her neck. She'd slept on Bobby's couch after drinking a few too many. He was bound to be hungover, too, but in spite of her neck Alex was glad she'd convinced him to sleep in his bed. His couch was much too small for him to sleep on.

She found her phone and checked the time. Still early, still enough time for a run. Bobby had kept his promise, and last night had been nothing more than kissing and holding hands. She was not disappointed. In fact, she wanted him more this morning than she ever had.

She tiptoed into his bedroom only to find him stretched out on his belly with one hand under his head and the other relaxed and stretched out on the mattress beside him. A wave of desire overtook her, but she kept her feet firmly planted in the doorway.

"Bobby," she said softly, and watched him stir. Alex smiled. "Bobby?"

He rolled to his side and rubbed the sleep from his eyes, then smiled at her.

"I'm going for a run, and then home to change. I'll see you at work."

He raised up on his arm and slid over to get up, but she stepped forward and stopped him. "No, don't," she said. "Don't get up. I just didn't want to leave without saying goodbye." One of her hands was on his muscular shoulder, and she felt his left hand slip easily against her waist.

Self-conscious about his breath, he leaned toward her and kissed her cheek.

"See you later, Bobby. I love you," Alex kissed his cheek as well, her lips accosted by the thick stubble that had grown during the night. "Go back to sleep," she whispered, and coaxed him back down to his pillow.

"Bye, Eames," he said. "Alex," he corrected himself.

* * *

Bobby isolated himself for the day in an interview room, scrutinizing the snapshots that had just arrived from Tungstall's courier service. He carefully sorted the photographs into piles.

Alex got hold of names, addresses, and phone numbers of all of Tungstall's servants from 2006 and also all of the employees of both construction companies. She brought in sandwiches from the cafeteria and plopped one in front of Bobby.

"How's it coming?" she asked him, as she set a cold soda in front of him.

Bobby gestured to his piles. I know all of these people; these have some unidentified women in them, and these have glimpses of clothing that may or may not be what the victim was wearing." He frowned and looked at the envelope in front of him. "And I have yet to go through these." He turned in her direction. "How about you?"

"I have names, addresses, and phone numbers for 57 people. An ID on the victim would make this job a hell of a lot easier."

"Any word from the forensic artist?" If the facial reconstruction were done, they might know if they had a photograph of the victim or not.

"Not yet. I think I'm going to put in a call after lunch."

Bobby opened up his wrapped sandwich and stretched his arms before he started to eat. "I could stretch my legs. Let's pay them a visit."

* * *

"We're going with 2D reconstruction," Laura said, as she pulled up a file on her computer. "It's just faster. We can always do 3D later if necessary." The plaster cast of the skull on the table beside her was adorned with little white pieces of Styrofoam, indicating the proper depth of flesh in various areas. On the computer, the data was listed. She punched a few buttons and the computer generated a picture of the skull, now with eyes and partially covered with muscles.

"Rodgers said the DNA was degraded, but we got enough to know she's Caucasian, probably of central European descent. I can have this ready for you…" she frowned and calculated the amount of time in her head. "By early next week. Unless my sister has her baby. Then it might be a little longer."

* * *

The detectives headed back upstairs, disappointed with the timeline. "We have to go with the call-girl theory," Bobby said. "If she wasn't a citizen, it will be doubtful that anyone who crossed paths with her will know she went missing. If she was a call-girl, some people knew her well. Someone would have to know she disappeared."

"I say we start with Tungstall's legislative pages. Maybe they used to beef up the guest lists for his parties."

Two hours later, Alex handed Bobby the names of two different escort services. He glanced over at her. "Pay a visit to Vice?" He asked.

She was hesitant, but she nodded. After all, very few of the detectives there now would know her. Her former Captain, Milton Wells, would never treat her any differently. They gathered up their jackets and headed for the car.

* * *

Bobby strutted. He always did that when they entered an unfamiliar squad. Some kind of macho thing, Alex figured. She walked ahead, as always, and led the way to the Captain's office while he strutted along behind her, binder in hand.

Once in the Captain's office, his swagger disappeared, and he was as polite and professional as ever. Alex accepted a hug from Captain Wells, and Bobby shook his hand.

"Major Case treating you all right, Alex?" The Captain asked pleasantly.

"It's keeping me busy, that's for sure, Cap," she said.

"Goren… Goren…" Wells snapped his fingers and held one in the air. "You had those 27 convictions in Narcotics."

"Yes sir, that was me," Bobby said.

"No wonder you're in MCS. I hope you're taking good care of Eames."

"Always," Bobby said, and the quick glance he gave her went straight to her heart.

"One of our cases brought up a couple of Escort Services from 2006," she said. Bobby took the note out of his binder that had the business names on it. He handed it over to Wells.

He did not miss the uneasy glance that passed between the Captain and Alex. "Okay, uh… Let me pull in one of my guys on this." He picked up his phone and dialed the extension. "Fryar, I need to see you," he barked. Within minutes, the door opened and the tall, thin detective walked in. After introductions and handshakes, the Captain handed him the note.

"Eames and Goren need the skinny on both of these companies. They've got a Jane Doe victim they think might have been one of the girls."

"Sure," Fryar said. He shrugged and tilted his head toward the door, leading the MCS detectives out.

"Eames," Captain Wells called, and she came back in. "Close the door." She waved Bobby on and did as the Captain asked. "You okay with this?" He asked.

"That was a long time ago, Cap," she said.

"Yeah, and so was the Civil War, but people ain't got over that yet."

She smiled at his attempt at a joke. "I'm okay, Cap."

"If you need anything, you let me know."

"Sure." She headed out to the squad room and found both Bobby and detective Fryar with ease.


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

"Some of the girls from Abalone Escort Service ended up in the employ of Pleasant Company. Your best bet is to hook up with them. Here are some old photos from 2006. Maybe you can get some info from one of these girls."

Alex clapped her hand on Bobby's shoulder. "See? I told you I could hook you up."

He chuckled, but his eyes checked hers for a moment. Bobby took the card off to a quiet room and made the call. Fryar turned to Eames. "I've got an informant who might be able to check out some of these girls, too."

Bobby returned. "They'll see me at 5. I can select my date for the night."

* * *

They'd secured a hotel room for the night and were using it for surveillance. Bobby straightened his tie and stood in front of Eames for inspection. She brushed some lint off his lapels, and rested her hands on his chest for a moment. "Watch your back," she said.

"That's your job," he teased.

Her laughter was in her eyes, but she was visibly tense. "I got you," she assured him.

"I know." Their quiet conversation ended, Bobby tucked the pack of cigarettes and lighter in his hidden pocket and checked his wire with the others. Once they confirmed they could hear him, he announced to the others, "Let's do this."

With one more glance at Alex, he walked out and down the street. At the end of the block, he checked his wire again. Receiving no phone call from Alex, he continued on his way.

"Robert," he said to the manager. "Robert Green."

"Good evening, Mr. Green. Welcome to Pleasant Company. Have you hired an escort before?"

"N-no," Bobby said. "I just… heard it was a… I heard it was a good idea."

"And what are your interests in women?" She asked. "We find that our clients have a much more satisfying experience when they choose an escort who they find physically attractive."

"I… I like all women," Bobby said. He had to get her to let him see the ladies' faces, so he could talk to someone who was linked to the senator. "I wouldn't… I wouldn't know what to tell you. I like… I like beauty."

At first she appeared frustrated, but then she smiled. "Just a moment, Mr. Green." She disappeared for a few minutes, leaving Bobby by himself with two very muscular bodyguards. Then she returned, followed by at least 8 beautiful women of all ages, ethnicities, and shapes. Bobby licked his lips and smiled. "Uhm…" he looked at their faces carefully, then wandered to the back of the group and stood before a gorgeous African American with an ample bosom. "Hello, are you available for the night?" He asked her.

She smiled and the manager nodded and sent them on their way. As the woman slipped her cape over her bare shoulders, he held the door for her and they stepped outside.

Bobby walked her down the street and into the closest hotel. She followed him to a room, and he couldn't help but notice she seemed disappointed. Bobby shut the door, then turned to her. "You… you wanted dinner, didn't you?" he asked.

"Most men at least spring for dinner."

He smiled at her. "I can do that," he said. He knocked on the door between the room they were in and the next. The door swung open, and Alex walked in with a pizza box, her badge shining from her belt.

Bobby's date sighed.

"Don't worry," Goren said. "If you're clear of warrants, you're not under arrest. We are investigating a case, and we're looking for information," he said.

Alex held up a diet and a regular soda and the woman took the diet one. Within minutes, she had a slice of pizza on a plate. Alex read off the records she'd gotten from Fryar. "Naomi Bonham," she announced, and the girl looked up in surprise. "You worked for Abalone Escort back in 2006."

"Y-yeah?"

"Do you remember getting hired to attend Senator Tungstall's parties?"

"Oh, yes," she said, and smiled. "Those were very good nights. He hired us to fill the room, and we weren't even expected to… to get close to anybody. Easy money," she said.

"Did you know the other girls well?" Alex asked.

"Most of them. I worked for Abalone for three years."

Alex glanced at Bobby, who leaned in and used his gentlest voice. "We found a woman's remains in Tungstall's old house. Do you recall if any of the girls went missing around September of 2006?"

"Greta." She said it without hesitation. She looked at both of them, and tears welled in her eyes. "Greta is dead? Oh, poor Greta!"

Bobby showed her a pile of snapshots. "Is… is Greta in any of these photographs?" He asked quietly.

They allowed her to sift through the photographs. "There," she finally said. She pointed to a woman, tall, with blond hair and blue eyes. "She was my friend," she said, and tears fell.

Alex handed her a tissue and got all the information she could from Naomi.

* * *

It was a late night, and while most of Bobby's brain was obsessed with the case, another sizable portion was thinking about Alex. He wasn't ready to call it a night, but he did so that he could accompany her home for a nightcap.

Now they sat over her kitchen table, and he could see a trace of melancholy in her eyes again. "It was difficult for you, stepping back into Vice," he said.

"You don't have to interrogate me, Bobby. What do you want to know?" She asked, shooting from the hip, as Alex always did.

He smiled with embarrassment. "Habit," he said.

"Yeah, I know."

"What was the private chat with Wells about?"

Alex frowned and swallowed. "Remember that undercover assignment I told you about?" He nodded. "Something happened to me during that assignment. I was pulled out, and… Wells just wanted to make sure I was okay."

"What happened?"

She held out her hand and he took it. Alex closed her eyes and turned her head, holding her breath for a moment before she finally said, "I was raped."

She felt his grip tighten on her hand. Bobby said nothing, but his heart was pounding in his ears.

Alex still avoided eye contact, but she spoke again. "Cap just wanted to know I was okay, working a case with call girls and coming back into Vice Squad."

Bobby slid out of his seat and got on his knees on the floor, to force her gaze to meet his. He held out his arms and she sank against him, comforted by his strength and acceptance.


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

Alex was feeling tough, so she accepted Bobby's hug, but she did not tell him about the rape or break down crying. She just rested in his arms a few minutes, then pulled away.

"Your knees have to be screaming by now," she said.

He didn't admit it, but she noticed the stiffness when he got back to his feet. Bobby dropped a kiss on the crown of her head and went back to his seat at the table.

"Want another?" She asked him, reaching for the bottle of whiskey between them.

"No," he said. "I… I want to get back to the office. I've got some things to work on."

"You need help?" She didn't want her partner to forge ahead without her, all because she dropped a bomb on him tonight.

"No," he said. I just have to get some of the puzzle… out of my head," he explained, motioning towards his skull with his hand.

"I understand," she said, and he knew she really did. When he got to his feet, Alex rose, too. She walked him to the door, where he wrapped her in his arms again. A million things flashed through his mind to say to her, but not even one of them escaped his lips. He found her lips with his, and gave her a lover's kiss. Alex held his cheek with her fingers, and then he turned and left.

* * *

Bobby went through all the pictures again, pulling the ones with Greta, making note of her clothing, of the approximate dates of the parties, of the people she was interacting with. Of course it wasn't certain the victim was Greta Schultz, but it was likely.

A search through the database turned up nothing, so it was possible she was illegal.

He found the best image of her and tucked it into a folder for the tech guys to blow up and enhance. He would get it from them in the morning. It was almost 2 a.m. when Goren called it a night. He didn't bother to go home, just crashed on a bunk in the locker room.

* * *

He left his cell in plain sight on his desk, so she knew he hadn't gone home. Before Alex had the chance to send one of the guys in to wake him, her phone rang. She picked it up. "Eames." She listened while the tech guys said the photograph was ready. "Great, I'll be right down," she said. Before she headed down to pick up the picture, she popped into the interview room where they had been laying everything out. She could see right away that Bobby had been busy.

She tapped his binder with her hand and walked down the hall to Tech. She decided against waking him; the commotion of 1PP during the work day would do that soon enough. She placed a call to Fryar to see if anything else on their Jane Doe had popped up. It wasn't certain that the victim was Greta, after all.

"Eames," he said, rubbing the sleep from his left eye. His face was puffy, and he had to feel as rough as he looked.

"Morning, Bobby," she said cheerfully. "Tech already delivered. Why don't you go home and get a shower and I'll pick you up in a while? We can start interviewing people, showing the pic around."

He nodded and gave her a sleepy smile.

Alex handed him her cup of coffee. "Here, you look like you could use this."

He normally didn't drink coffee with sugar, but he was so tired this morning, he was willing to. He raised the cup in a toast to his partner and choked out "See you later," then headed for the elevators.

* * *

Tungstall's former page was now a campaign manager. He invited them into his new headquarters and sat them down in desk chairs between stacks of boxes.

"Russell Milne," he said, shaking both their hands. "I spoke to you on the phone the other night," he said, pointing to Alex.

She nodded. "Mr. Milne, you said you hired women from escort services to attend some of Senator Tungstall's parties. We have some snapshots, and we were hoping you could look at them, tell us anything you know about them."

"Sure, be glad to," he said. Bobby handed him a pile of snapshots, almost all of which had Greta in them. He sat down at his desk and flipped slowly through them. "This one, this was at our campaign headquarters in Brooklyn. We had a big event just before the start of his second campaign."

He handed it to Bobby, who looked and then handed it back. "Can you tell us about the women in the photograph?" Bobby inquired.

Milne looked closely. "This one here, she was one of the regulars. I hired her from a service in the city. There were about ten girls, that I hired on a regular basis."

"From Abalone Escort Service?" Alex asked.

"Not regularly. I only used them once. Those girls dressed up well, but they were all foreign. They didn't know how to behave at a party for a distinguished gentleman. I usually called…" He paused and tilted his chair back, looking at the ceiling. "What was the name of it?" Abruptly, he sat up. "I know! Glenrich, it was Glenrich Events, or something like that."

"Do you know this woman?" Bobby asked, specifically pointing out Greta.

"She looks familiar, but I don't recall. The girls were just there to fill out the party, you know. I didn't really mix with them too much."

"Were you close to the Senator?" Alex asked.

"When we were in session, I was his slave, his therapist, his priest."

"He must have spoken to you about his home life."

"Oh, sure, plenty of times."

"Were he and Deborah having trouble back in 2006?"

"I wouldn't say so. Sure, Clay had his share of women, but when he was home, he was a devoted husband. She was sick a lot, and he always raced back to be at her side."

"But he resented it," Bobby said.

"I didn't think so. He was disappointed to leave his work, didn't want to let down his constituents, but he knew family comes first."

The detectives sat with Milne for more than an hour as he went through the pictures and gave them information. When they finally walked out to the SUV and got in, Alex exhaled deeply. "Politics," she huffed.

Bobby grinned.

"Family comes first, my ass!" She pushed the lever into gear and pulled out onto the street before Bobby even had his seatbelt fastened.

"Men in positions of power often-"

She gave him a warning glare and he stopped talking. "There is nothing you can say right now that will possibly improve my mood. And it's very likely that whatever you say could be a detriment to your health."

Bobby pursed his lips around a smile. He looked out the windshield at the bright blue sky. "Nice weather today," he said, grinning.


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

"According to Naomi, Greta was from Amsterdam. If that's correct, then we may be able to trace her path, figure out how she got here. That could lead us to her circle of friends."

"And enemies," Alex said. "I think we should look into who hired them. If Abalone wasn't hired except the one time, why did Naomi say she was hired for several parties? I think Tungstall wasn't the only one beefing up his guest list."

"You think his wife-"

"I don't know who else would want to."

They discussed it further and decided that Goren would find out as much as possible about Greta while Eames dug a little deeper into Deborah Tungstall. They separated for the day and agreed to meet for dinner at her place in the evening.

* * *

In the same way that Bobby couldn't stop thinking about the case, a section of his mind couldn't stop thinking about Alex, and what had happened to her when she worked Vice.

He knew he should let it rest, that Alex could tell him about it when she wanted… _if_ she wanted. But his damn brain wouldn't let him. Just when he was ready to call it a night, he put in a call to an old friend, who also used to work Vice.

* * *

"Bobby!" Jamal Williams said, giving him a very manly hug. "Good to see you!"

With a smile, Bobby jerked his head in the direction of a booth nearby. He ordered a whiskey, then the two of them walked over to the booth, Jamal with his drink in hand.

"How you doin'?" Goren asked. "I heard you're some kind of SWAT boss now."

"You know me," he said. "I just get a kick out of busting down doors."

The two men laughed. "You said you had something to ask me," Jamal said, as Bobby's drink arrived.

Bobby took a swig and swallowed it fast with a grimace. "I need to ask you about something, from your days in Vice," he said.

"Shoot."

"You know Alex Eames?"

"Yeah, tough lady. Good detective."

"She's the best." Bobby took another drink. "She's been my partner for…" he chuckled and shook his head, "a lot of years now."

"No shit!" Jamal looked at Goren with new eyes. "Either she's a special case or you've changed."

Bobby accepted his teasing with a smile. "A little of both, most likely," he said. "Look, Eames and I… we were talking the other day and… she told me something happened to her… when she was in Vice."

Jamal didn't say anything yet, didn't ask any questions, so Bobby continued. "She was undercover as a call girl for an escort service, and she said-"

"She was raped."

Goren's head snapped up, and for a split second Williams could read the fury in his eyes. "She didn't tell you the details."

"No."

"Look, man, this is not really—"

"I know it's not my business, but…" Bobby shook his head and drank deeply. "Jamal, I care about her."

"You're more than partners."

Again Bobby reacted a little too quickly. "No. Yes." Bobby rubbed the back of his neck. "Jamal. She's my best friend. What we've got going on, it's beside the point. It's not much, yet, anyway."

"Look, man, you don't have to tell me about any of that. Honestly, I don't want to know." Jamal glanced around the bar, then stared at the back of his hands for a moment. "Even I don't know much about it. I know she was raped. She was supposed to head up to the hotel room, but instead she went to his car. He took her on top of the trunk."

Bobby's fists were clenched as he listened.

"We convicted the bastard, sent him to Rikers."

"Was she… hurt, physically?"

"I don't know. She went to the hospital, she was out for a few weeks, and then when she came back, Cap gave her a lot of desk work and less of the sex cases."

"Her husband…"

"All I know is he took leave, stayed with her at first."

"Who was the perp?" Bobby asked.

"Paulo Giordano."

The big man was silent, and Jamal found himself checking his watch. "Bobby, good to see you, man. Don't be a stranger."

Bobby stood and gave him a quick hug, and Williams left the bar. Bobby ordered another drink. He was too angry to do anything but drink at the moment.

* * *

Alex Eames was treading carefully. No matter where she looked, she kept finding traces of things from her past: Names of girls, places, names of Johns. This case didn't directly overlap with her undercover work, but like any business, people made a career of it, and they had loyal customers.

By the end of the night, she was feeling sick to her stomach. Bobby had left an hour ago, and in another hour and a half, he would be at her house. She grabbed her things and headed home.

* * *

Bobby stopped back by 1PP before he headed to Alex's place. He was a little tipsy, but not enough that anyone would notice. He marched to his desk and did a quick search on the computer for Paulo Giordano.

Immediately, he smacked his hand against the desk. The man had been released on parole a year ago. As quickly as he'd come, he switched off the computer and left.

* * *

When he saw her, all the anger was gone. She was beautiful. Bobby entered the house and took her in his arms. He kissed his way down across her temple, down her cheek, and onto her lips. His kisses were deeper than before, and his body was yearning for her.

She broke away and said, "You've been drinking?"

"I met an old friend," he said. "I had a couple." She smiled, but her eyes told him she was concerned.

"I hope you didn't spoil your dinner," she teased, and led him by the hand to the kitchen. Alex had managed to put together a meal that would be sure to please him. She'd set the table and even placed a candle as a centerpiece.

Bobby looked at the food in front of him. "Not a chance," he smiled, and sat down.


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

The food sobered him, and after he helped her clear away the dishes and the leftovers, Bobby brushed his hands down over her hair. He kissed her sweetly.

"Wow," she said with a grin. "What's gotten into you tonight?"

The answer to that question would have required hours to communicate, so Bobby simply whispered, "Love. I love you. I just want to show you." He kissed her again.

Alex could feel her own body responding to him, to his warm, wet mouth, and his gentle hands. She snaked her hands across his waistband until they rested against the small of his back and returned his kisses. When she felt his body hard against hers, she scared herself.

Alex quickly pulled back, gasping for breath.

He worried. "I'm sorry," he said quickly, though he wasn't certain what he'd done.

"No, Bobby, don't," she said. She was shaking with desire and love and fear and she forced herself to step closer to him again. She reached up and put her hands at the back of his neck. His hot breath was against her cheek, and she kissed him, opening her mouth and teasing him with her tongue.

Bobby's hands were on her hips, and they slid slowly upward, just grazing against her breasts before he moved them back down again. Alex moaned and felt herself pressing into the hardness that had just frightened her so.

Bobby skirted the edges of her breasts and then carefully allowed each of his hands to support them, full on, nipple to palm.

Alex heart was in triple digits. She broke the kiss and dropped her forehead against his chest, watching his hands kneading, his hips swaying against her in a steady rhythm. She felt his lips on the back of her head.

He breathed her name, and she lifted her arms so he could remove her blouse. Her bra still concealed her bosom, but he dipped his head down and kissed her on this side of her cleavage and that side.

Bobby picked her up, cradled like a child, and his tongue reached into her mouth as he carefully walked to her bedroom. Gently, he set her on her bed. "Alex," he said again, and he climbed over her, kissing the bare spots on her torso and gently nipping at her bra with his teeth.

"Oh, God, Bobby!" She groaned, and he smiled. He leaned in, and her mouth was attacking his neck. He enjoyed it for a few minutes, and then he moved over to lie on his side next to her. His hand slid easily from her shoulder down and settled on the dip at her waist.

Alex was still panting. "Why'd you stop?" She asked.

One side of his mouth curled. "I thought you wanted to take it slow."

Alex held her breath a moment, and then let it out slowly. "I want… it all, Bobby."

Now his smile was complete. "You don't mean that. That's just lust talking."

Alex turned angrily to her back, leaving his hand to trace over the mounds in her bra. She arched her back, pushing back against his hand.

"Second base," he breathed, "and no more."

Now Alex had a grin. "Unless I convince you otherwise," she growled. She pulled his hand to her mouth and sucked the tip of his thumb seductively. He closed his mouth over her nipple and she felt his hot breath radiating out through the fabric of her bra. The second time he did it, she gasped, and he reclaimed his finger from her mouth.

He rolled onto his back, taking her with him. His mouth pressed against hers and his hands released the clasp at her back. Alex pulled away, and as her bra slid down her arms, her breasts fell towards him easily.

Bobby studied them with his eyes while Alex discarded the unwanted bra. He sat up, taking her nipple in his mouth. As he licked and sucked on one side, his hand kneaded the other.

Alex sat, grinding her crotch against the rock in his pants. Bobby switched sides, and she moaned aloud, twining her fingers into his hair.

She raised herself off him for a minute, then dropped back down when he least expected it. Bobby gasped in surprise, the suction of his lips momentarily broken. She dove down, her lips locked with his and her hands tearing away at his shirt.

Bobby helped her open his shirt, and she sighed to find an undershirt beneath it. She greedily slid her hands up underneath the tee. Eyes closed, a crooked smile on her lips, she let her fingers roam through the thick curls of his chest. Bobby's eyes were pure affection as he silently took a mental snapshot of his Alex.

In another few moments, they both were too confined by his shirts. Alex moved aside, and Bobby removed them both. Then he drew her into his embrace, filled with ecstasy at the sensation of her bare chest against his. Soon their mouths were locked again, and his hands were inching their way back to her heavy breasts.

"Don't stop," Alex told him between kisses. "More, Bobby, more." She shivered as his fingers drifted across her naked side.

"I love you, Alex," he whispered, and then forced himself to back away. His eyes were dark with desire, and he clutched the sheet in his balled up fists.

"Don't," she pleaded. "I want you, Bobby. I don't think I've ever wanted anything so badly."

He was trembling, one 'brain' dueling with the other. "You said…"

"I don't care what I said! I love you! I want you!"

The throbbing in his pants was creating a vacuum in his head. He could feel his blood rushing in his ears, a thunderous pulsing of need. She came closer and kissed his chest.

"You—you'll stop me if—" he asked.

She took his chin in her fingers. "I love you. I want you. I want _this._" And when her lips took his again, he gave in to the aching need of his body.


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter 11

The moment of release sent him hurtling into oblivion. They were one. The strongest desire of his entire life, granted. He lay back, eyes closed, unable to speak.

Speech was unnecessary. Their natural telepathy had just been catapulted to the next level. She lay on his chest, quietly panting, silently praying along with him that this moment would never end.

He held on as long as he could, but his body silently retracted itself, and both he and Alex felt an immense sense of loss when their union was severed. He compensated by drawing his arms tighter around her.

He fell asleep.

* * *

Alex had a hell of a time waking him up in the morning. Bobby, exhausted from his long work hours, relaxed by sexual climax, and tranquil from being at her side, was out like a light.

She showered, made coffee, and breakfast, trying sporadically between to get him to stir. At last, she crawled on the bed on her hands and knees and gently pressed her lips to the nape of his neck.

He stretched and sighed, and she did it again. Bobby turned over, and she savored his smile.

"You're going to be late for work," she said.

His smile faded. He groaned and forced himself to open his eyes. "What time is it?" He asked.

"Eight a.m."

Another groan, and she silenced him by kissing his lips. He opened his eyes wide and looked her over. Although she was dressed, he realized he was naked, and last night was no dream.

Bobby sat up. He ran his fingers through her hair. "Last night," he started.

"Last night was incredible." Alex still felt she was linked with him. She touched the pads of her fingers against his. They both stared at their hands, until she finally said. "I have to go. I'll meet you there, later?"

He kissed her hungrily, and she finally pulled away and hurried out the door. Bobby flopped back against the pillow, misjudged the distance, and cracked his head against the headboard.

"Ow!" He cried, and rubbed his hand against the knot as he forced himself to get up.

* * *

Everyone knows you should never compare lovers. It's not polite, and God forbid a previous one was better than the current one, you could end a relationship before it even started. But Alex found herself thinking about the previous night, and thinking about nights with Joe, and a handful of others she'd made love to in her life. Mostly she thought of Bobby, and she thought of Joe. Because of all her lovers, they were the only ones she could honestly say she truly loved.

What had transpired last night with Bobby had been different than anything she'd ever experienced with Joe. While her guilty mind wanted to say it wasn't "better" than sex with Joe, in a way, it was. It was real, and it was now, and that in itself made it better.

It wasn't just sex. What had happened with Bobby was metaphysical. She thought of that old Leonard Cohen song: "… I remember when I moved in you, the holy dove was moving too, and every breath we drew was Hallelujah…"

Yeah. That was what last night was. A Hallelujah.

* * *

Once she got to work, Alex grabbed a cup of coffee and switched on the computer. She checked her phone messages while it was starting up, and then she opened her email.

There was one there from Captain Wells. With a knot in her stomach, she clicked it open.

TO: AEames MCS. NYPD .NET

FROM: MWELLS VCS. NYPD .NET

Eames, I don't know if you were aware, but I just found out. Giordano was paroled 10-18-2011. I hope you already heard about this, but I thought I should send the word just in case you haven't. Take care, Eames.

Cap

Suddenly, Alex Eames felt a migraine coming on. She started to take a sip of coffee, but instead decided to hold the cup against her forehead.

She was still sitting like that when Captain Hannah walked by. "You all right, Eames?" He asked.

She removed the cup and rubbed at the red spot left behind on her forehead. "Uh, yeah, Captain. Thank you."

"Where's Goren?"

"He's on his way," she said.

"Come see me when he gets in. I want an update."

"Yes, sir."

* * *

It took another day of working separately, but by 5:00, Alex and Bobby were able to come together with some real information to share about the case. They holed up in the interview room, surrounded by the photos from the investigation.

Bobby sat across from her, smiling, until something in that telepathic connection zapped in a message that something was wrong. "What is it, Alex?" He asked.

She stared into his rich brown eyes and said quietly. "Giordano. The man who… raped me. He's free." She realized as soon as she said it that he already knew.

"Probation," Bobby nodded.

Anger flared up inside her. "You KNEW?"

"I only just found out."

She folded her arms, scowling at him.

"Yesterday," he added, as if that could possibly make anything better.

"You WHAT?"

Bobby's hand went straight to the knot on his head. He heard the anger, the yelling, but only registered a handful of the words. "something in confidence," " investigate me," and "last night?!"

He snapped to attention at those words, and suddenly he was filled with a fury of his own. "Last night has nothing to do with it!"

She tightened her grip on her own arms and stammered, "How can I possibly know that?!"

He smeared his hand angrily through his curls, making a section stand on end. "You… You believe what you want, then!" He paced to the door and back, twice. "I love you." His voice was stern, angry. He walked out, closing the door a little too hard behind him.

No one in the office knew why they'd argued, but everyone could read Goren and Eames' body language. There was no mistaking that the star detective team had just had a falling out.

* * *

A/N The song "Hallelujah" has been covered by almost everyone, and the verse I quoted is the verse most likely to be deleted when someone covers the song. Look up the original or find the entire lyrics and read them. It's amazing poetry.


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter 12

Twenty minutes later, Bobby came back in. Alex had been sitting at the table, massaging her own neck and shoulders. She knew he had to come back; they had work to do.

"You still mad?" He asked.

She shrugged.

"Let's do this, then." He sat down across from her and opened his binder. He withdrew a stack of information on Greta Schultz. "Greta flew from Amsterdam to Quebec July 8, 2005. We have a work history in Canada that fizzles out in April of 2006. Then she vanishes."

"That's when she slipped across the border."

Bobby gave her a slight smile. "I also found this." He held out an immigration photo from 2006. It was obviously Greta, but the name said "Anke Klein."

"But we got no hits from the database!"

"Anke Klein has been MIA in Canada since 2004."

"Another victim."

He shrugged. "Between the two names, I've come up with a list of people we can interview. What do you have?"

"Deborah Tungstall hired call girls."

Bobby raised an eyebrow.

"She was baiting her husband. She suspected him of cheating with everything on two legs."

"Expensive. Why not just divorce him? Or find a boyfriend?"

"Publicity? Pre-nup? We have to look into it." She folded her arms again. Now she had come to the part she didn't want to talk about. Especially since their argument. "And Bobby…"

That telepathy kicked in, and Bobby felt a pang in the center of his chest. He leaned forward, listening.

"Bobby, she used D & S to hire the girls. D was a new name, but S… S stands for Schumann. When I was undercover, Schumann was the Madame. We arrested her, but she got off."

All possibilities zipped through Bobby's head: they track down all leads together, or she sticks with the call girls and he sticks with Greta, or they switch. Bobby looked steadily at his partner. "It's your call."

She knew what he meant. And she knew it would feel good to get a second chance at Schumann. But she also knew it would bring back a lot, force her to reflect on those awful, horrible days.

"We'll keep on working what we've got," Alex announced, and the decision was made.

Bobby packed up his binder for the night. "You wanna…?" He asked, hopeful now that the anger was gone from her voice.

She shook her head. "I think I just need a night to myself."

It felt like a punch in the gut, but he knew he deserved it. Bobby nodded quietly and followed her out the door.

* * *

Goren changed into jeans, layered up his shirts, and headed out for a walk. He couldn't settle down, he couldn't stop the thoughts spinning in his head. One minute, he was remembering her scent, the next, he was braced against the anger. And he couldn't get the rape out of his mind, either. He didn't have all the details, but he had enough. He imagined all the horrible scenarios, and for the first time, he felt a kinship with Joe.

He wondered what venom Alex had spit at her husband in the days afterward, when she was recovering physically; in the months it must have taken to recover emotionally. Alex had never spoken ill of Joe, he must have handled it all perfectly. On the other hand, Alex was Alex. She had a tendency to snap at the hand that fed her.

And what about Bobby Goren, after all? Half of him wanted to prove how much he loved her, to take away her pain by showing her love like she'd never known. The other half wanted to find Giordano and send him just this side of hell.

So instead, he was walking the raucous streets of Brooklyn, drifting in and out of club crowds and Thursday night drunks. He found a seat at a bar and decided to keep it warm a while.

By 12:30, he was drunk. He paid his tab, took a piss, and walked out into the night, where the temperature had dropped to near freezing. He stumbled along, still not headed home, until he heard a cry coming from a back alley. A woman's cry. He ran as fast as his clumsy feet would allow, and arrived in time to see her broken and bleeding on the ground. The perps had disappeared. He got out his phone and called dispatch for an ambulance.

After she'd been taken to the hospital, Bobby stood at the mouth of the alley, staring down at the lights blinking and shouting in the dark. He was sober now, snapped to attention by the seriousness of the situation. Bobby thought of his miserable life, of his mother, and of Alex. Then his stomach lurched.

* * *

At 3 a.m., he was sitting on the sidewalk, the back of his head against the cold brick of an old tenement. He could feel the rough brick scratching his skin. Bobby shivered. He pulled himself to his feet and walked home.

* * *

"Are you okay?" Alex asked, before she remembered she was mad at him. He had taken time to shave, to put on a suit, but he looked rough.

Bobby looked over at her from behind puffy eyes and blew off her concern. "Yeah, couldn't sleep." He sat down and opened his binder, organizing his information and selecting the names he would contact today.

Alex tried to ignore him, but she felt terrible. Alarms were going off inside her, and so she got up and slipped on her coat. "Come with me?" she said.

Bobby looked up without raising his head. Was she letting him back in? He got up and followed her down the hall to the elevator. In the crowded elevator car, she allowed her hand to bump against his. Before he could grab on, the doors opened. He followed her out of the building and onto the sidewalk. She led him right to the coffee cart.

The barista was bundled up in a jacket, gloves, and hat, but seemed comfortable. Bobby was warm enough in his suit coat, but his ears prickled from the cool morning air. Alex turned and handed him his drink. She waited a few minutes more for hers, and he realized her eyes were tired, too.

Coffees in hand, they retreated to a park bench at the side of the building. It was sometimes busy in the summer, but now, with winter making an early appearance, the place was deserted.

Bobby sat beside her. Holding the cup with his left hand, he took a sip. He felt Alex's hand in his, and he turned toward her.

"It's kind of hard to get over," she said. "And I don't want to be angry any more… but damn it, Bobby! Why didn't you just ask me if you wanted to know more?"

"I didn't want to cause you pain."

She could see it clearly: the honesty in his answer. She felt him tighten his grip on her hand. She glanced around, then moved closer to him.

The kiss brought the healing they were both looking for. It started as a chaste apology, but almost immediately, they were both swept away as the embers from their evening together reignited. With great effort, they untangled from each other's arms. She held his hand until he was on his feet, then they went back into the world of detectives.


	13. Chapter 13

Chapter 13

The two detectives got back into their groove pretty quickly. They spent the morning tracking down the whereabouts of the people they wanted to interview and setting up appointments.

Alex's attention was drawn to her partner when she saw two uniforms she didn't know walk up and shake his hand. Someone answered on the other end of the phone that was on her ear, so she was unable to hear what the beat cops spoke with him about.

By the time her call was over, they were shaking his hands again. Bobby was on the phone before she could ask him about it.

Thirty minutes later, a suit she didn't recognize showed up. The man shook Bobby's hand, and Bobby led him to an empty interview room. A few minutes later, he left. Bobby stayed in the room alone.

Concerned, Alex walked back and eased the door open. "Everything okay?" she asked.

He glanced up, then spurred himself into motion. "Yeah. It was just… that was an ADA."

She waited.

"He was… hoping to call me as a witness…" Bobby gave her an apologetic smile. "I wouldn't make a very good witness in his case."

"What case?" She asked.

His gaze flitted around nervously. "Something… I stumbled into last night."

* * *

They parted ways before lunch, Alex to meet with former employees of D & S Escorts, and Bobby to track down people who knew Greta/Anke.

Alex's first two interviews had gone well, and she was now waiting in the hotel lounge to speak to a third. She was uneasy. Something about the place, the patrons, was giving her the willies. Alex was joined by a petit Asian woman wearing too much make up. She shook her hand.

"Hello," Alex said. "I'm detective Eames, I spoke with you on the phone this morning." The woman nodded, and Alex continued. "Several years ago, you worked for D & S Escorts."

"Yes, that's right."

Alex slid a picture in front of the woman. "You were hired by this woman?"

She nodded. "I remember her. She hired us, all of us, to attend these parties. It was easy money. She wanted us to come on to the Senator, but all she cared about was if he reciprocated. She didn't care if nothing happened. I could use another job like that, I'll tell you."

"Do you remember this woman?" Alex asked, showing a picture of Greta.

"Sure, that's Greta."

"Did Greta ever deal with… any tough guys? A pushy John, or have any enemies that you know of?"

"We've all dealt with a pushy John, it comes with the territory."

"I hear you," Alex said. She let the woman peruse the photograph a little longer. "We believe that Greta was killed. If you can think of anyone who might have…"

"Corasco. Freddie Corasco. He always picked her, never wanted anyone else. He'd even pay extra for her. And Greta couldn't stand him." She looked up. "I gotta go," she said.

Eames watched her walk off and take the arm of a well-dressed man.

* * *

"Hey," she said. "How's it going?"

"Mostly friends, no enemies. You?"

"I've got one possibility," Alex said.

"How're you holding up?"

Alex allowed herself a crooked smile. "A little creeped out, but otherwise okay."

"Good. I'll see you soon?"

"Six o'clock?"

"Sure."

* * *

Bobby wasn't doing as well as he let on. In between interviews, on the road, on the sidewalk, waiting to make contact, his thoughts were drifting. He thought of the mugging the night before, and he was ashamed of himself. He was of no use to the investigation. He'd been so drunk he hadn't noticed anything.

Her attackers were free to hurt someone else, all because he'd lost his senses in a bottle. And it wasn't the first time he'd let somebody down.

Again, he found himself thinking of his mother. Frances Goren, the librarian, single mother, who in spite of a mental illness managed to raise two intelligent boys to adulthood.

Bobby still liked to think that Frank might have turned himself around eventually. Nicole Wallace had managed to rob him of the chance. Bobby knew Frank was smarter than he, and stronger. He knew his brother could have done it, once and for all, if he could have just set his mind to it.

His thoughts turned back to his own life, and he silently offered an apology to his mother. He appeared to be the success story, the "good" son. But he had failed her so many times. Even in her final days, rather than focus on filling her life with moments of joy, he'd selfishly demanded she tell him about his biological father, and brought her to tears.

"Detective Goren?"

He shook himself out of his reverie and shook the woman's hand. Bobby unzipped his binder and removed the photographs of Greta.

* * *

"Elise Schumann," Eames said from behind a forced smile.

"Are you planning to arrest me?" The woman said. "Because you know my accounts are squeaky clean. In fact, I'm thinking of suing the department for harassment."

"No arrests today," Alex said sadly. "Just looking for some information."

"I have none."

Again, Alex smiled, willing herself to find some kind of patience for dealing with this woman. She pushed the photograph in front of her. "You knew her as Greta, or possibly Anke."

"Tall, blonde, looks like any of a dozen other girls I've hired over the years."

"I never said you hired her," Alex commented, with a little honesty in her grin this time.

"You always were too smart for your own good. I should have listened to my gut and never hired you. You cost me a lot of customers, lost me a lot of money."

"Oh. I'm so sorry you had to suffer." Her voice was dripping with sarcasm.

"I don't know this woman. Are we through?"

"I'll need your current address and phone numbers. In case I think of anything else to ask."

Angrily, the woman jotted down her contact information. She'd played the game before. If she didn't provide it, the police would track her down anyway, embarrass her in front of clients, in front of staff. Much better to let them call, meet them on their own turf with a lawyer in tow.

After she walked away, she picked up her phone. She knew of one other person who hated this Detective as much as she did.


	14. Chapter 14

A/N I'm going to beg for more reviews now, since I don't think you'll be able to speak by the end of this chapter. Thanks to all for the nice feedback!

* * *

Chapter 14

They met over takeout in the interview room. Bobby turned up the same name as Alex: Freddie Corasco. Eames had already given Hannah a heads up earlier in the day, and he had some other detectives researching Corasco, so the two detectives could still take their evening off. Bobby added his information into the mix, and the younger detectives headed out for a long night of deskwork, after Eames offered them a box of fried rice in payment.

Bobby picked at his food, but didn't eat much.

Alex could read his moods. What she couldn't always tell, however, was the right way to approach him when he got like this. For now, she decided to keep talking shop.

"I met with Elise Schumann," she said.

Instantly, Bobby's attention was fully focused on her. "She survived the encounter, I take it?"

"It wasn't easy, but I managed to keep my cool."

"Get anything out of her?"

"She recognized Greta as one of her girls. Then she sealed up like a clam." Alex ate some of her dinner. "We can bring her in for an interview, shake some more out of her."

"Sounds like fun," Bobby said. "Tomorrow?"

"Sure." She didn't miss that he was carefully reading her facial expressions. He really was worried about her. She looked down at her crumpled napkin. "She always was a pain in the ass," Alex said. "When she hired me, she insulted my appearance about 5 times before she told me I got the job. Then she brought me out as second string when the Johns came shopping." Alex glanced over at him, to find she had his rapt attention. "I think she hooked me with slimeballs on purpose." Alex shivered and folded her arms. "Maybe she suspected I was a cop."

"You sick?" She asked, gesturing to his full serving of Kung Pao.

"Ah, I… I don't know," he said. "Just tired from last night, I guess."

"Tired still needs to eat," she warned.

He closed the container. "I'll take it with me. Have it later." She packed up the other leftovers and they gathered their things and left for the night.

* * *

At his place, he sat on the floor with his back against the couch, flipping channels while she took a shower. When she came out, he offered her a smile. Alex sat down behind him, her legs on either side of his shoulders, and started massaging him with her hands.

Bobby closed his eyes and tilted his head back.

"What did you stumble into last night?" she asked, wondering if that was what was troubling him.

"Uh… huh…. A mugging," he replied, his words hampered by the sensations of her fingers against his muscles.

"Yeah?" Alex moved her hands up to his neck.

"Yeah. I got a bus for the victim, but I didn't get anything on the perps."

It would be strange for Bobby not to notice _anything_. She knew her partner. She gave him the benefit of the doubt. "Bad timing, huh?"

"Y-yeah." His head was lolling against her hands now.

She slipped them back to his shoulders again. Even though she could still feel the tension there, he reached back and put his hands over hers, stopping her. He tugged gently at her hands, and she crossed them over his chest and leaned down, kissing his temple.

Bobby turned, rising to his knees, bringing them both eye to eye. He didn't kiss her right away, but ran his fingers against her hair, her cheeks, her jaw. Alex reached for him, took his upper lip and sucked it lightly into her mouth.

He responded with a tongue along her lower lip. She greeted his tongue with her own, and her fingers twisted into the hair on the back of his head. The kiss deepened, and his palms cupped her face.

At once, he pulled away, staring at her with an intensity she'd only seen once before. Bobby got to his feet, took her by the hand, and led her to his bed.

He stripped his clothes off and stood before her, waiting while she did the same. Stepping closer, his hands gripped her waist, and he devoured her in another kiss. His hands caressed her abdomen, her back, her butt. Then his right moved up to her breast while his left dipped lower down.

Bobby's fingers combed through the curls of her pubic hair and explored her with tender motions. He avoided her clitoris, and only skirted the sides of her vagina. Still his fingers moved, independently, in unison, while his tongue moved deep inside her mouth.

At last, she was so wet against his fingers that his cock throbbed painfully. Bobby detached his mouth from hers but guided her with his hands to the bed. Contact was broken only long enough for her to lie back and him to straddle over her.

Alex found herself arching against his fingers as her hands ran over his shoulders, his head, his arm, whatever she could reach. He lay on top of her, his face nestled in the crook of her neck, where he kissed and nuzzled as she felt his body writhing against hers. She dragged her nails down the length of his spine and back up, more of a tickle than a scratch.

She raised up on her left elbow and he rolled off her, onto his back. Alex followed him, one hand wrapping itself around his manhood. Bobby momentarily bit his lip. He pushed himself into the hollow of her hand and used his own hands to tease and pinch her nipples.

Her hand drifted over his glans, and came back wet. She let go, crawled back, and lowered her head to kiss the soft place just below his belly button.

He whimpered, pushing his hips up, only to make sporadic contact with her flesh. "Gawd, Alex," he groaned. "I want to be inside you."

She grinned, dipped her head close enough he could feel the heat of her breath against his cock. She kissed the tip of it, and he yelped like a puppy. Alex moved her tongue in a swirl around his head and came back up with a gentle kiss. He groaned in agony.

"Alex, pleeeeaaaase!"

She stood on her knees and smiled at him. He grabbed himself and held his cock ready for her. Slowly, she sank over him, and they both moaned with pleasure.


	15. Chapter 15

Chapter 15

Trembling. Alex Eames lay tangled with her partner, trembling. Her head was over his still racing heart, his arm crooked over her back, his fingers splayed over the peak of her butt.

He was panting, lost in the same realm as she. When he came back to himself, he turned his head and wrapped his other arm around her, as well. "Oh, Alex, that was…"

She lifted her head and touched her lips to his. "Thirsty?" she asked him.

He nodded, and was disappointed when she rolled away from him to fill two glasses in the kitchen. Bobby retrieved his boxers from the floor and slipped them on. He was overly sensitive now, and needed something to keep him confined.

She returned, and he guzzled the water down. Alex went to the bathroom and put on her own underwear when she returned. "Can I borrow a shirt?" She asked him.

"Sure."

"I'd like to say I won't get cold in your arms, but…" She tossed one of his t-shirts over her head and crawled back into bed beside him. Bobby immediately drew her back into his embrace. "I love you, Bobby," she said.

* * *

He slept hard, until the dream. Alex was screaming for help, for _him_, and he was running in a thick fog. He couldn't find her. He ran and ran, tortured by her desperate cries, until he jolted awake, covered in sweat.

Bobby ran his arm over his forehead and stared at the dark ceiling. He could feel her breathing beside him, and he knew she was safe, but it took several minutes for his heart rate to slow.

His mind, on the other hand, never did slow down.

Bobby slipped quietly out of bed and pulled on his t-shirt. He walked out to the chilly living room and turned on the floor lamp. He sat down in his recliner and stared at the familiar shadows before him.

_He'd come home from college, with a newly earned degree, unframed, sitting out on the kitchen table beside his brother's bottle of booze. Bobby poured himself a generous helping and raised a silent toast to himself. Robert O. Goren, the first of the Goren family to finish college. The Goren who was going to save himself from the hell he'd been raised in._

_ The phone rang. He went over and picked up the receiver, careful to taste the whiskey before he spoke. "Goren residence," he said._

_ "Bobby! It's raining, and I didn't bring my raincoat. You have to come get me. I can't walk home in this mess!"_

_ "Ma, I've got things to do. How did you get home when I was away at school, huh? You can get home without me."_

_ "You ungrateful child! When have I ever asked for your help, Bobby? I put you through college and you can't even find the time to pick me up and bring me home?"_

_ "I had scholarships, Ma, don't flatter yourself. I'll see you later." He hung up the phone and drained his glass._

_ Bobby came home later that night to find his mother had not returned from work. He retraced her route from work, and there was no sign of her. On the way back home again, a neighbor yelled from her porch stoop. "Bobby Goren! How's your mother?"_

_ "Actually, Mrs. DeTillo, I'm looking for her. She never came home."_

_ "Of course she never came home, she was mugged, Bobby, didn't you know?!"_

_ "N-No, Mrs. DeTillo!" He felt himself panicking._

_ "Ambulance came, and police too. She's probably still at Brookdale."_

_ Bobby ran. Without even saying goodbye, he ran in the direction of the hospital._

_He tried to make it up to her, but he couldn't. So they argued. Day and night, they argued until he couldn't take any more and he enlisted in the Army._

* * *

He had coffee and breakfast made when Alex emerged from the bedroom. He gave her a smile, in spite of his weary eyes. "Good morning," he said quietly.

"Couldn't sleep again?" She asked as she leaned against him for a hug.

"I slept some," he answered.

She put her hand on his cheek, kissed him, then looked into his eyes. "Not enough," she said.

Instead of speaking, he kissed her. Then he turned and poured her a cup of coffee.

* * *

A stack of papers was waiting for them on Eames' desk. The rookies had done their job, researched Corasco thoroughly. "I think this'll keep us busy this morning," Alex announced, and handed half the stack to her partner. "I'm going to put in a call to Cap," she said. "Chances are Corasco's name has popped up in Vice over the years, as well.

Bobby nodded and leaned over the documents, reading.

* * *

Fryar called at 10 a.m. Alex greeted him cheerfully.

"Corasco was in the heat of things for two years, and then he just dropped off the radar. Maybe he's just one of those lucky ones who knows when it's time to hit the road, or maybe something happened to him. I don't know."

"Okay, give me the dates you have?" She wrote down everything he said. "Thanks, Fryar."

"And Eames?"

"Yeah."

"Somebody else just popped up on the radar, too."

Her faced paled when he told her the name. "Uh, okay, Fryar. Thanks. I owe you one."

"Have a good day, Eames. Good hunting."

"He gave you bad news," Bobby said. He'd been watching her.

"Giordano. His name is popping up in Vice."

"He's feeling safe again."

"He's going to hurt somebody else."

Bobby frowned. He wanted to take her in his arms, to tell her he'd keep her safe, but this was work and that would be ridiculous. Instead, he got to his feet. "You want a soda?" he asked her, his fists shoved deep into his pockets.

She stared at him. Something to drink was the last thing she needed right now. Noting how tense he was, she shrugged. "Sure."


	16. Chapter 16

Chapter 16

An hour later, the soda was still mostly untouched, but the bag of skittles was empty. Bobby hung up the phone and got up, hovering near her desk for a minute.

"I think I need to go to Canada," he announced. "Carasco was in their system, too. Maybe I can find out more about the real Anke, too."

"You think this could be serial?"

"I need to know more about Anke. I need to talk to the detectives. The file is too… cold, too dry." At the slight nod from her, he headed for the Captain's office.

* * *

She was in the drop off lane at the airport, with the car in park, looking in Bobby's direction as he stammered out an awkward goodbye.

"You'll do it with someone?"

"Captain Hannah already volunteered."

"Eames, maybe you should tell him… with Giordano popping up and all…"

Her expression was sad, but sincere. "I'll think about it, Bobby."

He leaned over the console, and they kissed. "I'll call you later," he said.

"I'll _see_ you later," she replied.

Another kiss, and he was out the door. He had no bags, and although his return flight wasn't booked yet, he had no intentions of spending the night in Canada.

* * *

Bobby shook the detective's hand and greeted him in French. They had a short conversation before switching back to English. Detective Pennau gestured to the chair by his desk, and Bobby took it. "So you're bringing Anke Klein out of the cold," he said, as he removed a thick file from his desk.

"My partner and I are working a homicide, and it appears that the victim may have stolen Anke's identity when she came into the US from Canada."

He looked up with interest, and Bobby started from the beginning, pulling artifacts from his binder as necessary to illustrate the story.

The man responded by opening Anke's file. "She also came over from Amsterdam, in 2000. Oddly enough, your victim's name shows up in our files."

"You interviewed her."

"She was very tearful about her friend's disappearance. She was convinced Anke was dead, but could give us no reason she thought so. Without any hard evidence, we had to let her go, and the case went cold. She slipped out of the country without anyone noticing."

"Now, Carasco," the detective said, "is a funny character. He was there, too, when Anke disappeared. We brought him in, questioned him. He was a US citizen, though, and before long he enlisted help from the embassy and we had to allow him to return to the US."

"You didn't have anything on him?"

"Just a gut feeling. The man was cold. He would probably have refused to help his own mother if she asked him."

Bobby's stomach turned. He swallowed and tried to refocus on the case.

* * *

Elise Schumann sat at a table in an interview room beside her lawyer. Alex offered them both drinks and then sat down across from her. She pushed the picture of Greta in front of her again.

"I told you I don't know that woman," Schumann said.

"You also seemed to think she might have been one of your girls," Alex stated. "I thought it wouldn't hurt to have another look." Schumann looked more in Alex's direction than at the picture. "Look," Alex said with a smile. "We believe this woman was murdered. I know you. You're all about business, about the bottom line. Do you think it will be good for business to have word get out that girls who work for you get killed?" Before she could protest, Alex continued. "I don't think you had anything to do with the murder, Ms. Schumann. But I do think you can enlighten us about this woman, and about who she may have had contact with."

The lawyer gave Elise a nudge with her elbow, and reluctantly, the woman spoke. "Greta Schultz," she said. "She worked for me briefly."

Alex took notes, asking clarifying questions about who and when. Hannah leaned against the wall and quietly sipped his coffee.

* * *

Bobby called Alex before his return flight, but got no answer. He left her a message and settled in for the short hop back to the city.

* * *

Alex went straight to Bobby's place. She parked the car around the block and took a short cut through the back lot, heading for the front door. Out of nowhere, a heavy man knocked her against a parked car.

Bent over the trunk, she reached for her gun, only to have her hand caught and pinned out at her side. She felt him yank the weapon from the holster, heard its heavy thud when it hit the ground.

He was pressing hard against her, his groin hard against the crack of her ass, his elbow over her back, pressing her down so hard she could only manage shallow breaths.

"I know you remember," he growled at her. "I know."

Then her back exploded with pain and she slipped off the car and crumpled to the ground. He was gone.

She gasped for breath and pulled out her phone. It was off, so she had to wait until it started up to make the call for help.

* * *

"Eames' phone."

Bobby did a quick double-take. "Captain? Where's Alex?" he asked.

Captain Hannah relaxed. "Goren. Your partner was attacked. We're at King's Hospital."

Bobby was waving down a cab in front of the airport. "Is she okay?"

"Looks like it, but she took a nasty kidney punch. They want to make sure she's not bleeding internally."

"King's Hospital, Brooklyn," Bobby told the driver. "I'm on my way, Captain."


	17. Chapter 17

Chapter 17

Alex was resting on her side when Bobby came in. He smiled, but it didn't mask his worry. "Hey," he said in his softest voice.

He was standing over her, and Alex had to turn her eyes to be able to see his face. "Get down here where I can see you," she grumped.

The chair scraped the floor as he pulled it to her side. Bobby sat down, and they were at eye level. "You're okay?" he asked hopefully.

"I'm supposed to watch for blood when I pee. A night in the hospital, and two to three days of bedrest, regardless."

His hand went to hers, and his thumb stroked it gently. "What happened, Alex?"

He could see the hurt, the anger in her eyes. "Giordano."

"You tell Captain Hannah?"

"Some of it," she said. And then, she told Bobby everything. She told him about the rape with all its details, and she told him about the attack in the lot behind his place.

A quiet fury was boiling inside him, but he stayed still and stroked her hand softly. "I need to see the Captain," Bobby told her. "Before he leaves."

She nodded, and he leaned over and kissed her temple. The Captain was pacing the hallway, his ear stuck to his phone. "Captain?"

He ended his call and looked up. "How is she, Goren?"

"She's…" and he suddenly had no words to describe it. "How would you be, Captain?!" he snapped, angrily. Then he rubbed the back of his neck and apologized.

"Look, Captain Hannah, I don't know how much she told you about… the… the history… with Giordano."

"I got the story from Captain Wells," he said. "I'd like to know whose brilliant idea it was not to fill me in when your case was so obviously crossing paths with that one?"

"Eames. It was… her business," Bobby said quietly, a challenge in his eyes.

Hannah shook his head and stared at the floor. "All right, I'm sorry. I just don't like to see one of my detectives like this."

"Someone's bringing him in, right?"

"He's already in holding at Vice." Bobby was satisfied, but then the Captain added, "but if we don't get something solid from trace, they'll have to cut him loose. Alex didn't see him. Even given what he said to her, a good lawyer could twist that into a PTSD response and reasonable doubt and he walks."

Bobby's fists were clenching and unclenching. "He followed her. From 1PP to my place. Nobody knew she was going to my place."

"I realize that."

"So what do we have?"

"He took her gun and threw it on the ground. Hopefully we'll get some prints. Or maybe prints and fibers from the car."

"He punched her," Bobby said. "Maybe the bruising… will match his hand…"

"We haven't checked that yet," Hannah agreed. "The docs were too busy with her when she got here."

Bobby turned and went back into Alex's room. His heart ached for her, and he sat down in front of her again. "Alex… I need to see the bruise. Take pictures, measurements."

She swallowed and blinked back tears, but she nodded. She knew why he needed to do it.

* * *

She didn't want to keep talking about it, to keep reliving it. When her family called, she would pretend to be asleep, or in too much pain to talk. Bobby got her permission to tell them what happened, and respectfully took the phone to the other room when he did.

It didn't escape her notice that he was on the phone the longest with her brother Johnny. She hoped they weren't planning some kind of vengeance. She didn't want her misfortune to ruin their careers.

He'd brought her home in the morning, and brought his work with him. He was planning to stay until she was on her feet again. She didn't ask; he didn't offer. It just happened that way.

Mostly she was quiet, and Bobby didn't try to push her to talk. He was very careful around her, only touching her hands or her face, unless she asked him to do more. Again, he found himself wondering how Joe had handled it when she was raped.

He left her in her room with a glass of water and a good book, and sat down on the couch with his laptop. His cell rang, and he picked it up. "Goren," he said.

"Hello Bobby, how's she doing?"

"She's resting, sir."

"Good. Something came in over here, I thought you should know."

"Sir?"

"A candygram. From Schumann to Eames. Let me read the card to you." After a moment, he spoke again. "Detective Eames, I'm so sorry to hear of your incident. I do hope you don't run into any more trouble. An investigator who is also a victim can't inspire much confidence with the public, now, can she?"

Bobby's jaw twitched. "Schumann was behind it?"

"I don't see how else she would know about it. When we interviewed her yesterday, Eames made a similar comment to Schumann about homicide being bad for business." The Captain cleared his throat and continued. "We got a partial off the car, and we're getting a search warrant for Giordano's apartment. Hopefully we can find the clothes that match the fiber. He'll be arraigned later today."

"Thank you, Captain."

"Give Eames my best, Goren."

* * *

"Does it still hurt?" he asked her as he climbed into the bed beside her.

"A little. Not like before. Mostly when I move."

Bobby lifted her shirt and looked at the bruise, now a rainbow of colors, with tentacles reaching out from the point of impact. "I wish I could say it looks better," he said. He carefully replaced her shirt. "It is healing, though." Bobby kept his hands to himself, and lay on his side, facing her back.

"Hold me," she whispered, so quietly he almost didn't hear her.

"Hmm?" He asked.

"Hold me, Bobby."

Immediately, he moved forward. Careful not to press his body against the angry bruise on her back, he lifted one arm over her torso and put the palm of his hand against her shoulder. Bobby kissed her neck, and his feet mingled with hers.

He felt her hand close around his arm. "He shouldn't be allowed to walk the streets," she said bitterly.

Bobby frowned. They'd just gotten another call from Hannah, that Giordano posted bail an hour ago. He agreed with her, and he was helpless to change the situation. All he could think of to do was kiss her neck again.

"The first time," she began, and tears filled her eyes, "I was ashamed. I didn't even want Joe to share the bed with me."

"What did he do?" Bobby asked.

Alex chuckled, then cried. "He dragged the recliner into the bedroom and slept in it." After a pause, she continued, "I was consumed with myself at the time; I didn't even think about what he needed."

"He needed to protect you," Bobby said simply.

She nodded, and felt his lips on her again. "I hate this. I wasn't strong enough—"

"Shhhh," Bobby whispered. "You don't have to be strong all the time, Alex."

He tightened his embrace, and she sobbed in his arms.


	18. Chapter 18

Chapter 18

Bobby hurried from the living room to her bedroom, his laptop open in his hand. Alex was sitting up against the headboard, mindlessly watching some show on the small tv in her room. Bobby thought she looked uncomfortable, but he wasn't the one with the bruise on his back.

"Alex, look at this!" he said. He walked around to her side of the bed and held out the laptop where she could see it.

She adjusted the tilt of the screen and stared for a moment. "That's her," she said. She looked again at the digital image Laura had sent over from forensics. It looked exactly like Greta. "Wow."

He looked one more time, then closed the top of the laptop and tucked it under his arm. "How are you doing?" He asked her. "You want anything?"

"I want to get this over with and get back to work," she grumped.

"Maybe I could run out, get something from the deli for lunch."

A small, irrational sense of panic rose inside her. "No, Bobby."

He looked at her curiously.

She reached out her hand and he took it with his. She wanted to shout _don't leave me!_ but she knew how pathetic that would be. Instead she said, "Let's just have some of those leftovers."

Bobby wanted to sit on the bed with her, wrap his arms around her, but he knew the jostling of the bed would cause her pain. He set the laptop on the floor, squatted down beside her, and kissed her hand. "You don't want to be alone," he whispered.

Alex felt naked. "It's stupid," she said quickly.

He shook his head. "No, it's not stupid." Bobby caressed her hand in his. "It'll take time, but you'll get over this. I'll stay with you as long as you need it, Alex."

"How am I going to do my job, Bobby?"

"We'll do everything as a team for a while. Until you're ready." He thought back to the days after her abduction by Jo Gage. He'd done it before. When she returned to duty, he'd accompanied her everywhere until she told him she was going to go out on her own. He smiled at the memory. She'd actually yelled at him to back off, that he was smothering her.

"What's so funny?" Alex asked.

"Remember, after Jo Gage…?"

"I don't remember anything funny."

"You don't remember the day you got sick of me and sent me back to the office?"

Something in her memory clicked, and she realized he had hung close to her in those days, knowing that she was afraid to be alone. She did remember. She remembered being angry and irritable with him. "I'm sorry, Bobby. You were only trying to help me, and I was completely unfair."

He chuckled. "It was funny. Don't be sorry." He remembered when he'd gone back to the office and Captain Ross had looked at him in alarm. He followed him to the Captain's office to explain, and soon both of them were laughing with relief. "You'll be fine, Alex. Give it time." He said, and raised himself up high enough to kiss her lightly on the lips.

* * *

In two days, Alex was back at her desk, and Bobby, true to his word, was sticking to her like glue. The junior detectives had continued to work the case in her absence, and with direction from Bobby and the captain, had uncovered more information about the Tungstalls.

Alex was reading through her data while Bobby was calling people on his phone. To her surprise, he was on the phone with Amsterdam. Once he hung up, she passed a paper his way. "Consultation with a law firm. She couldn't divorce him without grounds; she would have destroyed his political career and he would have fought her tooth and nail over everything. They recommended she wait until she had proof of his infidelity."

Bobby read it over quickly. "So who do you think is good for it?"

"Corasco. He may have killed before. Or either one of the Tungstalls. Corasco's a creep, but what's his motive?"

"I'm working on that," Bobby said. "I have to wait to hear back from Amsterdam."

The captain strolled by. "Good to have you back, Eames. How are you?"

She stretched stiffly in her seat, but said, "Fine, sir."

* * *

"Corasco was Greta's brother." Bobby dropped this bombshell with a flourish of his hand as he tossed the fax onto her desk. He was grinning proudly.

"Brother?!" How Bobby came up with these things, and then was right about them, was unreal.

"I looked a little further into Anke, and found out she and Greta had grown up together. So then I started thinking about Freddie, and it just didn't feel right how he hooked up with those two girls. Freddie changed his name when he became an American citizen. He was born Friedrick Schultz."

"So did he kill Anke?"

Bobby shook his head. "No, but somebody did, and he was afraid for his sister."

"So he helped her flee Canada and get established here."

"Why did she hate to see him every week? I hope he wasn't_ that_ kind of a brother."

"Maybe he was… judgemental. Trying to get her to find another line of work. Maybe he was… still worried for her safety."

"With good reason."

"We have to find Freddie." He'd dropped off Vice's radar years ago. That was not going to be easy.

* * *

A/N Thanks everyone for the reviews! It's always nice to hear what people think!


	19. Chapter 19

Chapter 19

Alex felt the water racing over her head and down her back and tried to let the warmth and her deep breathing calm her again. It had only been 15 minutes. Bobby had been in the shower for 15 minutes, but that had been long enough for her to panic. She'd checked the locks on the doors, drawn the curtains. She'd closed the bedroom door and shut herself in, anything to try and feel safe.

And of course it was stupid. She wasn't alone, he was still with her. He was just in another room. With water running. He wouldn't be able to hear her if she called to him.

It had been awful. Bobby came out of the shower with a towel wrapped around his waist. He must have seen something in her expression, because he asked "are you all right?"

And she'd lied and smiled and said "fine," and gone into the bathroom to take her own shower. She'd really gone to hide from him, to try and regain her sense of self-control.

It wasn't working. She wondered if he might step out while she was bathing, maybe go buy a paper or something.

_He won't leave me, _she told herself. _Bobby promised. He won't leave._

But she finished her shower in haste, wanting only to know for sure that she wasn't alone.

He was sitting on her bed when she got out, watching a ball game and munching on a handful of almonds from a bowl on her nightstand.

Instantly, relief washed over her. She went to her dresser, got out something to sleep in.

Bobby was watching her. He pretended to be interested in the television, but he knew she was upset. Finally, she joined him on the bed, and she leaned close when he put his arm around her.

He was wearing only his underwear, and to Alex, the feeling of his bare skin against her was medicinal.

Bobby noticed how she clung to him. He kissed her hair and after a few minutes, spoke quietly. "Have you thought about going back to Olivet?"

Alex jolted upright. "I don't need therapy."

He said nothing. He didn't want her to push away from him.

"You're tired of babysitting me," she said.

"No, no, no," Bobby groaned, even as Alex still spoke.

"You think I'm too clingy, and it doesn't make any sense, it's stupid, I know it's stupid, and it's driving you crazy."

"Alex. No." He held her by the elbow and stared intensely into her eyes. "I just know how hard this is for you. Even just now, with me here, you panicked. I just thought maybe Olivet could help."

"No."

"Okay."

After a stubborn stare, she slowly settled back into his embrace. He was relieved. He didn't resent being with her at all, and he actually cherished the opportunity to hold her, no matter what the reason.

Even now, with all that was interfering with their relationship, he wanted her. With his right arm occupied over her shoulders, Bobby reached down with his left and adjusted his shorts.

His movement didn't escape her attention. While he stared at the basketball game on television, she stared at his shorts. Then her eyes drifted over his bare skin, the hair that trailed down from his chest and then was hidden by his underwear.

She turned slightly, and put her right hand on his stomach. She slowly glided it one direction, then the other. Soon his left hand was over hers, and he turned to face her.

"You… you're starting something… I might not be able to stop," he warned quietly.

Alex smirked. She reached up and kissed him.

"You're sure?" he said.

She answered with another, deeper kiss. Bobby's hands began to move over her back. He was careful to avoid the healing bruise.

Alex wanted him. She could think of nothing in the world that would make her feel better than the feeling of him inside her. They petted each other a few minutes longer, then she yanked at his boxers and managed to get them partway off. Bobby slid them off quickly. By the time he turned back to her, she was naked from the waist down.

His hand went right to her crotch, even as his lips locked against hers again. She opened her legs a little, and his fingers dipped and swirled as he explored her pussy.

He could feel her body's response to him. She grew more wet, and his fingers slipped easily in and out of her. Alex's breath was frantic, and she chirped in surprise as his middle finger grazed against a particularly sweet spot.

Bobby smiled and did it again. Alex found herself riding his hand. She tried to return the favor by grabbing his cock in a firm grip, but her own sensations were making it impossible to concentrate.

He dropped away from her a moment, and then she felt the tip of him slide against her until he paused at her throbbing entrance. He carefully lifted her leg over his hip, then steadied himself against her and firmly pressed his way in.

Her breath caught in her throat. It felt like the first time, like she'd never known love before.

Bobby was thoughtful. He held her closely against him, not allowing her much room to move. He, however, moved constantly. Slow to fast, teasing and twisting and then driving hard until she burst into orgasm. He followed with his own, giving a second tier to her ecstasy. They shuddered in one another's arms, recovering, and he panted a whisper. "Are you all right?"

She almost laughed. "Oh..." She felt her entire body tingling, like some kind of soft current was running through her. "Yes."


	20. Chapter 20

Chapter 20

"The name Corasco didn't turn up any hits, so I also ran through Schultz and Klein. Kind of common," Alex said, handing a page of her printout to Bobby. "37 hits in the tri-state area."

"Let me," Bobby said, holding out his hand for the rest of her printout. "I want to… think about it."

"Be my guest," she said.

* * *

"He wouldn't have stayed in the city. His sister was killed; he failed to protect her, Vice was closing in…" Bobby took the page containing the New York names and turned it face down on his desk. "We've got no solid work record on Corasco… The guys in Canada said they thought he was in the drug business."

"Really?"

"High end pot. You know, there's a pot convention in Amsterdam every year. The Cannibus Cup."

Alex just stared at Bobby, her expression a mix of amusement and wonder.

"It's international. People compete for… the honor. The reputation. I'm sure it does wonders for sales."

Now she was thoroughly amused. She smiled and shook her head slightly.

"Well, anyway, he has connections in Amsterdam, still. So he can probably get the good stuff. Bring it to the states, sell it to the rich…"

"Party favors," Alex said.

"Exactly."

" for people like Senator Tungstall."

Now it was Bobby's turn to grin. "If Tungstall killed Greta, then Freddie would have been next on his list." Bobby turned back to the printout in his hand. "If he stayed in the pot business, he'd have a better chance in Connecticut."

"Or maybe Atlantic City."

Bobby nodded in agreement. He handed her the New Jersey page and he kept the Connecticut page.

Alex smiled. "Time to get some driver's license photos."

* * *

Bobby held the photo in front of him. Freddie was older, and now sported a mustache, waxed on the tips. It was a trend in some of the wealthier circles lately, waxing a mustache. Alex was spot on; Atlantic City was the place.

She drove out of the city in good time, and they were going to make it to Atlantic City by three in the afternoon. Bobby stole a glance at her profile while she was driving.

"How are you today?" He asked her.

"Fine. Why?"

He chuckled softly to himself. "I mean… you know, emotionally."

"Oh. That." She change lanes, checked the rear view, and sighed. "I don't know. I guess I'm okay."

"You're feeling safer?"

"I think so."

He ruminated on this a while. "Maybe we can stay at my place tonight? I need to… take care of some things…"

She threw him a wary glance, then shifted her eyes back to the road.

"Maybe I'll just ask your brother to stay with you a while, so I can go home and-"

"We don't need to do that," she said. "Why do you think you need to do that?"

"Your hands… tightened around the steering wheel when I brought it up. Your posture is… tense."

"Don't do this to me, Bobby!" she shouted angrily.

He raised his voice somewhat, too. "I didn't _do_ anything, Alex. I just… I need to take care of some things at home, and if you're not ready-"

Her heart was racing, she was trembling, and she was starting to sweat. "I'll do it. I'm fine!"

He opened his mouth to speak, then closed it again. Bobby stared at her a full minute before turning his eyes back to the road in front of them. "I don't think you're ready," he said quietly.

"I said I'll do it. Can we just drop it, now?!"

Bobby scrubbed his hands over his face. She barely heard him say, "Yeah. Sure."

* * *

"Mr. Klein?" Alex asked, as Bobby strode in ahead of her. Only a handful of people were in the room. The Laundromat was not very busy in the afternoon. He saw the badges on the officers and stood at attention in front of the tumbling dryer.

"NYPD?" he said, reading it off Bobby's badge. "This is New Jersey."

"Thanks for the geography lesson," Alex snarked. "We have some questions."

"We found Greta's remains," Bobby said very quietly, so that only Freddie could hear. "We're investigating her murder," he added.

Corasco paled and allowed Bobby to take him by the elbow and lead him to the nearest row of chairs.

"You changed your name to Klein," Goren said. "You were hiding from someone," he added.

Hesitantly, the man nodded in agreement.

"We need to know the whole story," Alex said, leaning in close.

Bobby opened his binder and readied his pen to take notes, but the man didn't speak. "She was attending Tungstall's parties," Bobby prompted.

"I loved my sister," Freddie said. "I raised her from a child."

"In Amsterdam." Bobby agreed.

The man brushed tears out of his eyes. "I was trying to protect her! It's all my fault!" He sobbed.

* * *

The detectives convinced him to talk to them in a more private place. He retrieved his clothes and they followed him up to his apartment. Before long, the three were seated around his dining table.

"In Canada, something happened. Anke," Bobby prompted.

Freddie was surprised the detectives knew that part of the story. "Anke was Greta's best friend, when they were children. I was trying to get Greta… out of the… sex… business. A man in Amsterdam had beaten her, and I was worried for her safety. I thought if she went to Canada… I could help her."

He continued. "Anke, however, worked for an escort service, and Greta was already working by the time I got there." He turned to each detective, grieved to remember it. "It was all Greta knew. She always told me she liked her work, and she refused to quit. I guess leaving Amsterdam made her feel safe again."

"But then Anke was killed."

"She had a regular customer, a man with important friends. She found out too much." Freddie hung his head. "Greta knew the man, suspected him. Before we left Canada, she was threatened."

Bobby remembered what the detective Pennau had said, that Corasco was cold, wouldn't even help his own mother. It didn't match the man who sat before him. "The Canadian police… said you were cold… heartless, even."

He glanced up quickly. "I was protecting Greta. For her, I could do anything, be anything." He held up his hands and gestured to the lifeless room around him. "Now? None of it matters."


	21. Chapter 21

Chapter 21

The first bit of relief came when there was an open spot on the street in front of his place. Alex wouldn't have to park in the back lot. She removed the key and hurried around to the sidewalk, checking warily for signs of her attacker. Bobby put his strong arm over her shoulders and walked her to the door of the building.

She felt a tiny measure of relief when they were inside the building, but there were still lots of places an attacker could hide. Finally, they arrived at his door and he let her in. Once he closed the door behind her, locking it, she felt another slight wave of relief. Bobby got to work right away: he watered the plants, then sorted his mail. He tucked his bills into his binder and zipped it shut. He went down the hall to his bedroom, and Alex followed him.

She stood to one side while he gathered some clothes out of his closet and drawers and packed them into a garment bag. Alex sank down to the bed, arms folded across her chest as she watched him work.

"Almost done," Bobby said. He grabbed two pairs of shoes and zipped them into the smaller pockets of the bag. "Okay," he said cheerfully. "We can go, now."

He handed her his binder to carry and he took the clothes. He put his free arm around her again as they walked out of the building and into the dark street.

* * *

Alex hadn't said much on the ride back to her place. They'd come inside, and after she made sure the doors were locked, she'd gone to the bedroom with him. He extracted his clothes from the garment bag and went to work tucking them into the closet. She laid on the bed on her side and tucked her knees up under her arms, watching him.

When Bobby turned back to Alex and saw her, it saddened him. His quick stop had taken a toll on her. He kicked off his shoes and climbed into the bed beside her. He reached out his hand, hoping for hers, but she didn't budge. Instead, he ran his fingers against the line of her jaw.

"I can't stand this," she said. "I hate feeling like this."

"Afraid."

"Bobby, I have lived in the city all my life. Shouldn't a whole lifetime of good memories trump a handful of bad ones?"

He couldn't respond to that. His own life hadn't been anything like hers. He didn't have a "lifetime of good experiences."

"Maybe you're right," she sighed. "Maybe I should see Olivet again."

He moved in closer and wrapped his arms around her, kissing her forehead.

* * *

It was the same damn dream again. Bobby wiped the sweat off his face and got out of bed. He poured a glass of water in the kitchen and chuckled to himself. _Maybe I should see Olivet, too._

Rooting in the cabinets, he found her stash of liquor and poured a stiff one. It made sense. He was worried about Alex, he was investigating another frustrating case where women were the victims. Bobby always got too involved in these cases. He always had a protective surge when it came to victims. That was why he was so tenacious about following through, even in a years-old case like this one.

And 'protective surge' didn't even come close to describing how he felt when he thought about Alex. She didn't deserve this. Any of it.

* * *

They were back to researching Tungstall again. Corasco's input had put him back under the microscope. The name they'd been given had yet to show up in any way in Tungstall's life, but they both knew they were getting closer. They could smell it.

Alex felt safe at 1PP. Maybe it was because she was surrounded by her fellow cops, and knew every last one of them would put their life on the line, if need be, to protect her. Maybe it was because she'd filled this seat for years and always been able to protect herself when a suspect got out of hand. It just felt different in the squad room.

Bobby headed off to the bathroom and Alex took a break, too. She refreshed her coffee and then made a call on her cell. When he came back, he settled right back into the research. Alex stared him down until he looked her way. She leaned forward and said in a low voice. "I made the appointment."

Bobby smiled, and a tiny part of him was relieved.

* * *

By late afternoon, Bobby and Alex were back in the conference room, bulletin board covered with fresh photographs. Captain Hannah came in. "Catch me up in," he checked his watch, "ten minutes. I have a press conference."

Alex began, pointing out the trail of people as she spoke. "Senator Tungstall had his page hire call girls to beef up his parties, make him seem popular to his guests. He cheated on his wife, often. She began hiring girls for his parties, too, trying to catch him in a tryst. One of the girls she hired was Greta Schultz, our victim."

Bobby continued. "Greta is from Amsterdam. She ran into some trouble there and followed a childhood friend, Anke Klein, to Canada with encouragement from her brother Freddie Corasco, who had emigrated to the US a few years prior. In Canada, Greta and Anke were both working as call girls with Blaze Samuel, who had political connections in the US. Anke turned up dead, and Greta feared for her life. Her brother Freddie helped her assume Anke's identity and flee to the US, where she ended up a working girl again, and attending Tungstall's parties. Corasco provides pot and other drugs to the rich and famous. He ends up finding out about Greta, and soon after she turns up dead. He flees to Atlantic City under the name Friedrick Klein and that's the end of the story."

"Until she turned up dead in an unfinished basement," Hannah said. "Corasco good for it?"

"The only thing he's guilty of is selling overpriced party favors."

"Who, then?"

"We've got a full house of suspects," Alex said. "We need to get them all here, turn up the heat, get them talking."

"Tomorrow. Make it happen," Hannah said. Then he turned and left.


	22. Chapter 22

Chapter 22

They left the building together and headed into the parking garage. One of the junior detectives who had been helping on the case followed and called, "Detective Goren!" In the doorway of the garage.

Both looked back. Bobby gave Alex a signal to wait just a minute and went back to the doorway. Alex waited, but after staring at the SUV a few minutes decided not to wait any longer. She walked the 30 feet and went around to the other side of the vehicle to get in the driver's seat.

Bobby turned as the other detective headed back inside and glanced in the direction of the car. He couldn't see Alex. It should have been a reason to celebrate, but he had a bad feeling.

He heard something, a bump and a scrape. He jogged a couple of steps, and then he heard Alex's voice.

"Help! Bobby!"

Immediately it was muffled. He ran full speed, his hand ready to draw his weapon.

Giordano had her shoved over the hood of a car and was yanking at her clothing, almost like he was hoping to hurt her.

Bobby shouted as he drew down on him. "Police! Get down on the ground, NOW!"

Of course Giordano didn't. But he did turn slightly to look. He turned just enough that Alex could get her elbow free. She rammed him in the ribs with her elbow as hard as she could, and when he staggered back a step, he lost most of his grip on her. She turned and her knee met his groin with all the force she could muster. He cried out, but he lashed back, landing a punch to her chest just before he felt Bobby's arm around his neck and the glock pressing against his lower back.

"Get on your knees!" Goren commanded. For emphasis, he pushed the barrel of his weapon deeper against the man's flesh.

Giordano complied. He got down, saying something like "don't shoot." "Lie down on your stomach," Bobby commanded, and he and Alex helped him do so. Bobby stuck his knee on the back of the man's neck and Alex wrenched his hands behind his back and cuffed him.

Bobby searched him and called for assistance, which came within seconds. They hung around long enough to make their statements, and Bobby got Alex out of there as quickly as he could. He drove, not sure if she was up to it.

Once they got a few blocks away, Bobby pulled the SUV to the side of the road. He killed the engine and held the key in his hand as he turned his head back and forth. "Are you hurt?" His voice was calm and quiet, but he didn't sound like himself.

Alex sat with her arms across her chest, absently rubbing her hands against her arms. She turned her head slowly, until her eyes locked with his. "I… I guess not."

Bobby's face was full of distress. At first he couldn't tear his eyes from her, and then he shut them hard and let out the breath he hadn't even realized he was holding.

"Bobby, take me home."

Somehow, he managed to get the car going again.

* * *

Once they were safely inside her apartment, they shared a confused, relieved embrace. Her clothes were stretched, snagged and torn. Bobby helped her get out of them and inspected her new cuts and bruises. She changed into her sleeping clothes, and he got her an ice pack for her elbow.

"At least I got him this time," she said. "At least I got him."

"He probably won't walk straight for a month," Bobby agreed, and they snickered together. The feeling only lasted a moment, though. Bobby held her again, gave her elbow another look, and then snugly tucked her in. He held her until she seemed to be asleep.

Then Bobby Goren sat staring into the dark of the room. She'd been thirty feet away, and he'd failed her.

* * *

The only comfort he'd had during the night was knowing that she had slept soundly. Goren had only managed troubled fits of sleep, from which he'd wake in the dream, or reliving his past. He'd check on Alex, and then he'd turn back to the troubled waters swirling in his mind.

Six a.m. came awfully early.

* * *

They stood together in Captain Hannah's office, as the man glanced carefully from one to the other. Alex looked weary, but Bobby looked beyond exhaustion.

"You're sure you're both up to this?" Hannah asked, focusing his gaze for a long time on Goren.

They nodded.

"I'm bringing in Field and Marsh. They're already familiar with the case, and they can take the lead so the two of you can move in and out as you feel necessary."

"You don't need to do that, Captain," Bobby protested.

Hannah was as big as Bobby. He rose to his full height from where he'd been leaning against his desk and looked Bobby in the eye. "I'm doing what I think is best for this case and for my detectives. It's not open for discussion."

"Too many cooks!" Bobby protested. "We're going to miss something important!"

"Maybe I should give the two of you the day off, then?" Hannah said it as a warning, and Bobby angrily backed down. He followed Eames out to their desks.

She watched him closely and quietly said, "Walk with me, Bobby."

He lumbered along beside her, down the hall into the elevator, and up to the roof. The air was chilly, but the wind was still, and they were comfortable there.

"You're pretty jumpy today," she told him, looking out at the skyline ahead of them.

He almost snapped at her, but instead he grimace and twisted and grunted something that wasn't quite a word.

"Talk to me."

"I just… I didn't sleep, that's all."

"I've seen you when you don't sleep. This is something else. Tell me."

Bobby knew he'd failed her, and he was prepared to carry that guilt with him the rest of his life. Somehow, the thought of saying the words to her, of exposing his failure, was too painful to contemplate. He folded his arms and turned away, pretending to be interested in the buildings across the way.

"Okay, look," Alex said. "I know I've been a mess lately, and a pain in the ass to be around."

"You were attacked, you had good reason," Bobby muttered, immediately at her defense.

"You've been there for me, Bobby," she said, reaching out to put a hand against his arm. "I appreciate it."

"I wanted to be there," he said quietly.

"So now I'm here for you," Alex responded, her voice softer. "I need you to tell me what's on your mind, so I can help you get through this day." She saw him stiffen, even as she said the words.

Bobby's mind raced. _You can't understand. _Of course she would. _I can't tell you._ She would handcuff him and wait forever, it seemed. _It's stupid._ That's what her excuse was to him the other day. _I don't want to._ Some relationship we have, then. _I can't show you how weak I am._

He took a step away from her.

"Goddammit, Bobby, maybe Hannah's right! Maybe we should just go home and let the juniors take over!"

He turned and saw the determination in her expression. _Shit._ Bobby's face twisted up, like it always did when he didn't want to say something. "I… I should have been there, all right? I should have stopped him."

She stepped forward and almost took his arm again, but decided against it. "You did stop him. Without you, I couldn't have…"

Bobby shook his head, and when he looked into her eyes again, there were tears gathering in his. "You don't understand," he said. "I never… I'm always…" In complete frustration, he sat down on the cement edge of a large, square planter.

Alex sat down beside him, so close he could feel her warmth.

He stared at the rocky surface of the rooftop below him and somehow, the words came. He told her about his mother, about joining the army to get away from her; about his weakness. He told her how he felt when he heard her calling for help.

Alex's fingers found their way to his. Slowly, Bobby realized she was still beside him. She was still sharing her warmth with him. She wasn't judging him. He squeezed her hand, and he felt her lips on his cheek.

Slowly he turned and looked into her eyes.

She smiled. "I'm tempted to take the day off just because I'd like to be with you." He gave her a shy smile. "Are you up for this? I mean, really?"

"As long as you're with me," he said.


	23. Chapter 23

Chapter 23

While other officers rounded up the suspects and brought them in, Bobby and Alex locked themselves in their interview room and strategized. An hour and a half later, they brought in Field, Marsh, and the Captain to lay it all out on the table.

Bobby and Alex would work as a team. Field and Marsh would work separately, and the Captain would make sure the important information got to the right parties. At the same time, Blaze Samuel was in custody in Canada and would be interrogated by detective Pennau. Detective Fryar had come over from Vice, to observe, help out, and see if anything of value might come up for his squad.

The group broke up, each taking a file full of photographs and other paperwork with them. Goren & Eames headed straight for interrogation A & B. Detective Field went to interrogation C. Detective Marsh went to D. Captain Hannah stationed Fryar in the observation room between C & D, and he took the job of observing Goren & Eames.

Bobby, Alex, and the Captain stood in the observation room and watched while Deborah Tungstall was escorted in. Five minutes later, they watched Clay Tungstall come into interrogation B. A uniformed officer checked in with them.

"They didn't see each other?" Bobby asked, and the uniform shook his head. "Thanks." They watched while he left the room.

"Deborah first," Alex said. She jerked her head in the Senator's direction. "He can wait," she said.

Bobby nodded, and followed her into the room where Mrs. Tungstall was waiting.

"Good morning, Mrs. Tungstall," Alex said, and sat at the table across from her. "I'm sorry to have to bring you in here," she said, apologizing for the drabness of the room. "There just wasn't any other private room available today."

"It's all right, I don't mind," she said.

"Mrs. Tungstall, we've turned up some things in our investigation, and we need to ask you some… difficult questions… to clarify things for us."

"The woman… you know who she was?"

"She worked for an escort service."

Deborah put her hand over her face, and slowly lowered it back to her lap. She was paler, and her expression carried much more concern. "I didn't say anything at first… Trying to divorce Clay has taken years, and there have been a lot of rules imposed upon us… I guess I've gotten used to keeping my mouth shut."

Alex nodded in sympathy.

"Years ago, when Clay was in the legislature, I suspected he was cheating on me. At first I tried to convince myself that it just came with the job; a powerful man, playing the game the 'good old boys' played…"

Alex shared a quiet glance with Bobby, remembering he'd tried to tell her the same thing.

"I tried to live with it, but I couldn't. You know, when you love someone… you expect them to love you back in the same way. Power and peer pressure would never have driven me to other men. I couldn't understand how he could do that and love me at the same time. I still can't believe that. When people love each other, that's it. They love _each other._"

"And it just made it hurt worse that I started getting sick more often. I really didn't understand my illness at all. Now, looking back, I think the stress had a lot to do with the frequency of the attacks. It was a source of irritation to Clay. He would have to keep up the image of the good husband; come to be at my side whether he was in session or not. I couldn't stand it: his fake concern, knowing all the while he'd rather be with another woman. I started hiring call girls to attend his parties. I was hoping I would catch him cheating on me. I thought that would help me get a better deal when I divorced him. I knew I could get away with it. He had his page do it all the time."

Deborah looked up at Alex, and then Bobby, with pain in her eyes. "The woman… was she one of mine?"

Alex nodded slowly and passed a picture across the table. "Her name was Greta Schultz."

Deborah's eyes filled with tears. She reached out with her fingers as if to touch the woman in the photograph. "I am so sorry," she whispered.

"Did you catch him?" Bobby asked, from the corner of the room by the door. "Did Clay ever… with one of your girls?"

She looked over at him, replacing her hands in her lap. "No. Not more than a pinch on the behind or something." She scoffed. "I kept it up until he was out of office. I never got word that anything went past casual contact."

"He was on to you?" Bobby asked now.

"I don't think so. I don't know. Maybe."

Goren touched his partner's back, and she followed him out of the room. They met for a moment in observation, where the Captain was sitting backwards on an office chair, arms folded easily over the back.

"I want to talk to the Senator," Bobby said. "I want to know if he knew."

"You're buying her sob story?" Hannah asked.

Alex and Bobby shrugged in unison. "Maybe," Alex said. "We'll let her think so a while longer, at the very least."

Hannah nodded and turned in his chair as the two went to work in interrogation B.


	24. Chapter 24

Chapter 24

Bobby took the lead position with the Senator. He sat across from him and opened his binder. He kept the photographs in his hand and gestured with them while he spoke.

"Hello, Mr. Tungstall, you remember Eames," he said, waving a fistful of pictures in her direction.

Eames lifted her hand to say hello, then folded her arms and leaned against the wall.

"Mr. Tungstall, we know you used to hire call girls to attend your parties. Did you know your wife used to hire them, too?"

Tungstall's face registered surprise, but whether it was surprise that his wife had done it, or surprise that the police found out was impossible to tell. Bobby laughed and turned to Eames. "I wonder if he had any… you know, _real_ guests… at his parties?" He turned his smile towards Tungstall, who felt the sting. "Maybe you weren't as popular as you thought, hey Senator?"

"Explains why you lost that last election," Alex said, sadly shaking her head.

Bobby slapped a picture of Greta in front of him. "You remember her," he announced.

"She looks familiar, yes."

"She was at a lot of your parties. She's the woman whose dead body was found in your unfinished basement."  
"It's awful," Tungstall said.

Bobby turned the picture and stared at it. "You knew her," he said again, "but she wasn't… one of your girlfriends. You knew if you tried anything with her, you'd end up in a mess with your wife."

"Girlfriends?"

"We already heard from your former page, Mr. Tungstall," Alex said. "We know you were sleeping around."

Bobby grinned again. "I wonder… if he resented leaving the legislature to help his poor sick wife… or was it really leaving the girlfriends that he resented?" He spoke to Alex, and they both smiled.

Tungstall got angry. "How dare you accuse me—"

"Of sleeping around? That's well established, Mr. Tungstall. Too bad your wife had to blow all that money trying to get evidence of it; we could have told her in one afternoon…" Bobby seemed to get lost on another train of thought. "How did you find out, Mr. Tungstall? Was it the money? The money that she kept spending to hire them?"

He pressed his lips together and folded his arms. "Okay, yes. I found out what Deborah was doing."

"It was the construction, wasn't it? She told you that the money was disappearing in the costs of the construction projects. The basement wasn't the only one, was it?"

"Yes. She was doing everything she could to make me miserable."

"Oh, not everything," Alex chimed in. "She never cheated on _you_."

Bobby tossed another photograph on the table. This one was of Blaze Samuels. He watched Tungstall's reaction to the picture: fear, followed by anxiety.

"How did you meet him?" Bobby asked, his voice suddenly more friendly.

"H-he…. I don't know him."

"Oh, come on!" Alex groaned. "Be honest, Tungstall. Save us a couple of hours. He'll tell us himself, you know. Lying isn't going to get you anywhere."

Tungstall stuck his fingers into his hair and held his head like it was going to explode. He took a deep breath. "At a strategy meeting. We were planning the next campaign. He brought in some girls. He wanted me to try and get on the bandwagon with some bill that had to do with trade laws. I don't remember now. Samuels gave us a lot of money for our campaign. I invited him to a party."

Bobby glanced in Alex's direction, then looked back at the man in front of him. "The party at your house, when your wife had just gotten out of the hospital."

Tungstall nodded, and Hannah's knuckles rapped the two way glass. The detectives rose and left the room.

Hannah handed them a page of notes. "Fryar just popped in. Russel Milne just confirmed that Blaze Samuels made significant campaign contributions and attended Tungstall's parties."

"We've verified the connection," Alex said. "How are things going in Canada?"

"Haven't heard yet. I think I'm going to give them a call, make sure they hold this guy as long as they can. We may need to extradite him."

"What about Schumann?" Alex asked, with a bit of venom in her voice.

"She's already lawyered up. Marsh can't get a thing out of her, but she did make some snide remark about Giordano's arrest."

Goren and Eames each saw the little burst of anger in the other's eyes. They quickly looked back at the Captain.

He smiled at them. "Fryar's already on it. He thinks he can prove that she put Giordano back on you, Eames. He'll take her down." The Captain looked at the two of them, and saw again how tired Goren looked. "You two take a break while I call Pennau. Don't start again until I'm in here to observe."

They nodded and headed for the bathrooms. Then they walked together to the break room and each picked up a broken half of a bagel left over from someone's morning generosity.

She caught him rubbing his eyes. "Crashing?" She asked.

"Nothing stale coffee and bagels won't cure," he said, and nearly broke a tooth biting into the bread. He tossed it back on the plate. "I guess I'll stick with coffee."

There was a heavy sadness between them. Neither wanted to admit it, but even as they stuck together throughout the day, it hung over them and threatened to rain down on them at any moment. There was no telling what kind of rain it would be, either: maybe the soft rain of pain and tears, or maybe the heavy downpour of lightning and anger. For now, it just hung in the air, and they both braced against the inevitable storm.

Alex manipulated the vending machine and soon a package of m & m's landed in front of Bobby on the table. As he ripped the bag open, it registered in his mind that she hadn't dropped any change in the machine. "I should arrest you for that," he teased.

"That machine's stolen enough change from me over the years. Believe me, I'm still in the clear."

She sat down across from him and managed to eat the stale piece of bread on a napkin in front of her. She sipped her coffee. Bobby poured the rest of the bag of candy into his mouth and followed it with a large gulp of coffee.

"We'll get through this," she told him.

He glanced around. Reassured that they were the only ones in the room, he whispered, "I love you, Alex."


	25. Chapter 25

Chapter 25

"Mrs. Tungstall, do you recognize this man?" Alex asked, shoving a picture of Samuels in her direction.

She nodded. "Blaze Samuels. He made a big contribution to Clay's campaign. I never thought I'd hear the end of him. And I can't tell you how many dinners and parties and drinks I had to attend with him." She shuddered.

"What was he like?" Alex asked conversationally.

The woman glanced over at Bobby and replied in almost a whisper. "I couldn't stand him."

Alex cocked her head slightly. "Why?"

Again, Deborah glanced at Bobby uncomfortably. Alex looked over at him and a silent argument ensued.

_Alex: She wants to be alone with me._

_ Bobby: No. I'm not leaving you._

_ Alex: I can handle her._

Bobby stepped forward and touched Alex's elbow. "Can I, uh, speak to you a moment?" he asked in a soft voice.

"Excuse me," Alex said apologetically to Mrs. Tungstall.

He waited until they were in the observation room. "No, Alex."

"Bobby, she's not dangerous."

"You don't know that."

"I can handle her," Alex protested. "You can watch from here."

The Captain watched them volley back and forth, but did not interfere.

"You _know_ what we need to do," Alex reminded him.

Goren's face tensed, but he said nothing. Alex patted his tie with her hand and went around into the interrogation room. Bobby spun on his heel and watched, while Hannah watched him. He could hear her voice through the speaker.

"Sorry, Mrs. Tungstall," Alex said. "You were going to tell me about Samuels."

Tungstall licked her lips and swallowed. "H-he" She sighed. "I don't even know where to start." Tungstall crossed her legs one way, then the other. "My sister told me I should just leave him and the money and everything behind, but I was determined that he should have to pay me something for the pain and suffering he was causing me," she said. "Baiting him wasn't working, so I was still dragged around with his caravan whenever he needed to have his wife around, to boost his image."

"That was about the time Samuels showed up. From the moment he wrote the check, Clay was putty in his hands. Samuels always had two or three women with him. He treated them, all of us like dirt. At our house, we were having drinks one night, and he sent me to refill his glass just so he could shove one of the women Clay's way!"

"I came back in the room and she was on Clay's lap, and Samuels was watching. I… well, I told him what I thought of him."

She started to cry. "Clay didn't defend me. He just made some excuse about it being all in fun and I went up to my room and cried. I thought everyone had left, and when I heard my door open, I thought it was Clay, come to apologize or something. It wasn't. It was Samuels. He came in and…" she frowned and shuddered again, "and he put his hand on my hip and I was so scared I couldn't speak. Samuels… he touched me, and he said when he wanted my opinion he'd ask for it. I screamed so loud Clay had to come. He asked him what he was doing in our room, and Samuels made some excuse about getting lost on the way to the bathroom." She looked over at Alex. "I don't know what he wanted with Clay, but whatever it was it was important enough for him to throw a lot of money Clay's way."

"Were there drugs involved?" Alex asked.

She looked shaken. "There were always… some at the parties. Some of those people couldn't make it through a day without coke or booze or weed or something. I never did that, though."

"Was Samuels involved in the drug aspect of it?"

She nodded. "I think so."

When Alex joined him again in the observation room, Bobby was relieved. With only a meaningful stare, he turned and marched to the other interrogation room, motioning for her to follow him.

Clay Tungstall had removed his suit coat and loosened his tie. He was growing tired of waiting. "Look, I can only entertain this for so long before I'm going to call my lawyer."

"We just have a few more questions," Bobby said, resuming his seat on the opposite side of the table. "Where did you get your drugs?" he blurted. "We know your parties were full of them."

"I had nothing to do with that. Probably Milne or one of his people. They were the ones who planned the parties."

"And Samuels, he was buying? Or he was selling? Or maybe he was just trafficking between the US and Canada and needed your support to keep his business healthy?"

"Are you accusing me of something?"

Bobby shrugged and wiggled his head in an odd way. "That depends. Did you DO something?"

"No, of course not."

"Fine." Bobby turned to Alex. "My partner, she wouldn't have been one of your girlfriends. She's too short, right? You like 'em tall, like Greta?"

"What?!"

"Or maybe it was Samuels that picked your girls for you."

"What?!"

"Settle down, Goren," Alex said quietly. "He's not going to tell us anything if you upset him."

Bobby laughed. "It shouldn't upset him, Eames, if he just says what kind of girls he likes." Bobby turned to him again. "You do like 'em tall, don't you? You like kissing while you're… " Bobby writhed his body a moment, "churning the butter?" He threw a hand back towards his partner. "You couldn't do that with Eames. She's too short."

Alex folded her arms. She knew what Bobby was doing, but today, it was bothering the hell out of her. She knew what the next step was, too, and damned if she didn't think she could go through with it. After a deep breath, she stepped forward. "Goren," she said. "You need a break."

To her surprise, he balked at the idea, and he wasn't acting. Had she read him wrong? Alex decided maybe she had, but she felt she knew what needed to happen for the sake of the case. Her knees were shaking, but she asserted herself again. "Take a break, detective."

Even the subtlest of his movements were angry. He grabbed his binder and closed it, walking out with it in his arms. On the other side of the glass, he slammed the binder down on the floor and watched her work with his arms crossed and his jaw twitching. He was set to blow.

"I'm sorry, Senator. What can I say? He's a Democrat," she smiled, and watched as the politician accepted Bobby's hostility as political distaste. "We need to know it all. All about the girls, all about the drugs, all about Samuels."

Tungstall started talking. He spoke quietly and continuously for several minutes, Bobby hanging on every word, every movement, every glance the man made.

Fryar came in and started briefing the Captain on something.

"Take it somewhere else!" Bobby snarled. "I can't hear!"

A very quiet Fryar looked at the Captain, then at Bobby. Captain Hannah spoke again, and he saw the red flush to Bobby's skin. Fryar left and the Captain walked over and stood next to Goren.

"I just… I fell out of love with Deborah. She's a good woman, she deserved better, but I just didn't love her anymore." Alex was playing the sympathetic part, and he continued, "It was so easy to cheat," he said. "A divorce would have ruined my career, but a few dates… no one would know about that, even Deborah."

"But she did know."

"She suspected. She didn't know. She wasted all that money trying to trap me…"

"Tell me about Greta."

"It wasn't supposed to happen."

"Tell me about it."

"Milne hired her that first time, and God, I couldn't get enough of her. Deborah missed that event, she was recovering from another bout at the hospital. Her sister was taking care of her."

"Greta was amazing. And she brought this pot with her… I swear, that stuff must have been laced with Viagra. I was relaxed and horny and confident and so was she. I had to see her again."

He was misty eyed thinking of the past. "Milne said he was dropping them because of some kind of faux pas the other girls had made… I knew Deborah was trying to trap me. I knew she was hiring girls. I dropped the card on the counter with some paperwork Milne left for me and I knew she would find it."

"How long… did you and Greta have an affair?"

"Eight Months."

"And then Freddie Corasco showed up," Alex prodded.

"He threatened me. He said I had to stay away from Greta." Tungstall wiped the sweat from his forehead with his arm. "I was scared, and I wanted to stay away, but Deborah hired her again, and Greta found me, and oh my God…"

"And when Samuels turned up?"

"He seemed like he knew her. She wasn't the same with me after that."

"But you did see her, at that last party?"

"She told me we had to talk. She told me Corasco was her brother, not to worry about him. She told me she loved me." He broke down and sobbed. "I made love to her in that nasty, dirt basement! And when we were getting dressed, Deborah's sister… she was there. She saw us."


	26. Chapter 26

Chapter 26

"You're saying that Deborah's sister killed Greta?"

"No, I don't think she could kill anybody. She doesn't have it in her. None of Deborah's family could do such a thing."

"Who, then?"

Tungstall sobbed. "I don't know! I didn't even know she was dead! I thought her brother convinced her not to see me or Deborah bribed her not to or something!"

* * *

"No rest for the weary," Alex whispered to herself, as she laid out the Styrofoam containers that held their dinner on the table in the interview room. Bobby rubbed his eyes and scraped his hands across his evening growth of beard.

Alex handed him a plastic fork and dropped a straw into his soda cup for him. "Field says they'll have Deborah's sister here within the hour."

"Deborah said he never slept with any of the girls she baited him with. Do you think she lied?" Bobby spoke between bites of his grilled chicken.

"I don't think she lied. Maybe her sister never told her?"

"Her sister was her only ally through all of this."

"Maybe she didn't get a chance to tell her."

This comment made neurons fire in Goren's brain. He reached for his overstuffed binder and rooted through the paperwork. When he found the page he wanted, he reread it carefully. "She went back in the hospital, right after the closing up of the basement. Deborah had another bout of pancreatitis."

* * *

Linda Ecker, Deborah Tungstall's sister, was led into the empty interrogation room where her sister had been. With a determined nod, Goren and Eames went inside. "Thank you for coming in, Mrs. Ecker."

She exchanged some pleasantries with them, and Alex continued. "We've been investigating events that happened in 2006, when your sister's husband was still a state Senator."

"Yes, Deborah told me about it."

Bobby sat in a chair beside Alex, but shoved it back from the table and stretched out his long legs. "I was talking to Clay," he said. "He said you… caught him… red-handed with another woman."

She sighed and the disgust on her face couldn't be mistaken. "Bastard. He never loved or appreciated my sister."

"Did you inform your sister of his… affair?"

"I was going to. I told Clay that night, right there, that he should be ready for everything, his career, his trophy marriage, and him to go straight to hell. But then," she burst into tears, "that man, that awful man! He grabbed me and whispered in my ear that there was no need for all of that. He said he would take care of it, and if I knew what was good for me I would never tell anyone about it!"

Bobby shoved a photograph of Samuels in front of her. Her sobs erupted once more and she nodded. "That's him!"

"He told Clay to get me out of there, and to make sure I kept my mouth shut. I heard the girl scream once, like she was in pain, but by then we were on our way out to the car and Clay drove us out onto the old state road and all the while he was telling me not to ever cross that man, that he thought he was a killer and if any of us wanted to live to see tomorrow we should never ever cross him."

"Clay was terrified. I had never seen him scared, and that scared me even more. Deborah got sick again, and I never said anything to her. I hated that she was still with Clay, but I knew she was strong, and that she would be able to get away from him in time."

* * *

"The scream must have been from the broken fingers," Alex said. "Then he slit her throat, gave her a quick burial, and left her body in the dirt."

"And he pressured Tungstall to close up the basement project for good."

"I'll be glad to see this guy behind bars."

"Pennau is holding Samuels for us. Marsh and Field are going to Canada to retrieve him, and you two have the next three days off." Captain Hannah was happy to announce the last, thinking they would appreciate his generosity.

"Three days?" both detectives protested.

"A good nightcap will help you sleep," the Captain said. "Call me if you need a good recipe." He left before they had the chance to complain again.

* * *

Alex was able to get them to her place in one piece. After they were inside, Bobby sank onto the couch and she sat next to him. "Long day," she said. "You're still feeling guilty?" she asked.

"I just feel like I should never let you out of my reach," he said, taking her hand in his.

"You know that's not going to work for us long term," Alex remarked.

Bobby shut his eyes and nodded, waving a hand in the air as if to say "of course I know."

"Maybe you should talk to Gyson," Alex said.

Bobby groaned and let his head fall back against the back of the couch. "I saw her for a fucking year, you'd think I'd be okay by now," he griped.

"I saw Olivet for a fucking year, you'd think I'd be—"

"All right, all right," he interrupted her. "I get your point. I'll call her."

Alex smiled. "Now. As for tonight, I don't see anything wrong with staying within your reach." She leaned in and kissed him. "Come to bed," she whispered.

She led him by the hand down the hall to her room, helped him undress, and left him on the mattress while she changed out of her clothes. Eyes closed, Bobby smiled as she slid in close to him and put her hand on his chest. She reached over and kissed him on the lips, and when she pulled away, he was sound asleep.

Alex nestled her head against his arm and left her hand resting over his beating heart. As she breathed in his scent, she felt safe. She tried to stop her mind from spinning through the day's interrogations, from trying to make sense of murder, which frankly never made sense. She tried to focus on his scent. With a grin, she closed her eyes and worked on a recipe for it: raw strength, compassion, brilliance, persistence, and passion.

With one gentle finger, she wrote the word "love" on his chest, and then she fell asleep.


	27. Chapter 27

Chapter 27

When Bobby Goren's consciousness returned, he recognized the sound of gentle breathing beside him. He turned his head toward the sound and opened his eyes.

Alex was on her side facing him, her face soft and relaxed. She was beautiful. Bobby studied her for several minutes, memorizing the soft curve of her cheek, the quick turn of the tip of her nose, her not quite red lips… thinner without the makeup, but delicate and inviting. Bobby touched her lips with the pad of his finger. He traced his finger down her chin, then brought it to rest on her strong shoulder and ran it slowly down the length of her arm.

He was so engrossed in his examination of her that he didn't realize she'd opened her eyes. As his finger slid over the bones of her hand and down her middle finger, she snared it between her own fingers. He looked up and saw the quiet smoldering in her eyes.

He moved closer, tasting her lips, and her delicate hands smoothed across his ribs and back. Alex intensified the kiss, and with a gentle roll one way and then the other, his arms were wrapped tightly around her.

The kisses were deep, but slow and tender. Neither was forcing any of it on the other. She stopped long enough to stare into his eyes, and saw her own love and desire reflected there.

In the same way the tide brings the water higher up the bank, one gentle wave at a time, each movement, each touch brought them closer until he eased his way inside her. They rocked against each other and soft sighs escaped their lips. They moved so slowly that Bobby surprised himself when he came, tensing and holding her against his body until the pulsing stopped.

He loosened his grip on her and brushed the hair away from her eyes. "Sorry," he whispered. "I kind of… got lost."

Alex smiled. Somehow, in spite of all that had happened to her, Bobby's touch never felt wrong. She kissed the edge of his mouth and then his jawbone, feeling his already thick whiskers with the tip of her tongue. "Oh, Bobby, don't ever apologize… for _that._"

As they kissed again, his hands drifted across her breasts until he let them rest on her hips.

* * *

The waiting was unbearable. Bobby sat outside Olivet's office, in one of the chairs, thumbing through the same pages of a magazine over and over and over again. He'd read it four times, and now was just glancing at the pictures. Unable to contain his energy any longer Bobby put the magazine on the end table and got to his feet. He paced the small room until at last, the door opened. He smiled in relief and watched as Alex made another appointment with Dr. Olivet and said her goodbyes.

As they walked to the car, Bobby put his hand on the small of her back. He needed the contact. At the driver's door, he paused, letting her decide if she was up for driving. She was, so he shut the door for her and walked around to the passenger side. After he got situated, he said only one word. "Well?"

"She thinks it's a bad time to start a relationship." Alex swallowed hard. She didn't want to hurt him. "You know, rape is... intimate... and traumatic... and I could be mistaking a feeling of safety for real love... or the opposite could happen. I could mistake your love for me for pity... or worse, I could decide one day you're trying to control me..."

His fingers fiddled nervously with the air vent in front of him. "W-wha… what do _you_ think?"

"I think she's too late with the warning." He caught her determined glance and his eyes hung there a moment. "I love you, Bobby. I'm not going to ask you to step aside while I work out all my issues. I can't do that to you." She swallowed, then continued. "Besides, since when has anything the two of us have ever done been easy?" She smiled at him then, and gave his hand a squeeze. "We're in this together."

* * *

"I… uh… my… my anxiety is uh… kind of… at a peak today…"

"I can see that."

He paced and rubbed his neck with the back of his hand. "I… uh… well…"

"Robert. We're not strangers."

"Dr. Gyson, Eames and I have… started a relationship."

Surprise registered, and she smiled.

"Only… Eames says nothing we've ever done has been easy…"

"Smart woman."

He tilted his head and allowed himself a small smile at her quip. "Sh-she's been attacked... raped… a… uh… it was a long time ago," he said with a quick wave of his hand. "But this case we were working… well, the same man who… and she was attacked again and…" Bobby checked his watch.

"You're feeling responsible."

"N-no… yes… I know I'm not responsible… but…"

She grabbed her prescription pad and started writing.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"Are you willing to try the medication again?"

"The-the benzodiazepine?"

She smiled again. "Yes. As needed."

He looked around nervously, then finally nodded. "Y-yes. Just until…"

"Until you don't need it anymore."

Now Bobby smiled at Dr. Gyson. She really seemed to understand.


	28. Chapter 28

Chapter 28

Goren and Eames stood before Captain Hannah, smiling and more relaxed than he'd seen them in this last 2 ½ years he'd been their Captain. "What can I do for you?" He asked casually and sat in his chair.

Bobby swung the door shut and sat down in front of Hannah, crossing one leg over the other, ankle to knee. Alex chose to lean against the chair, or maybe it was more Bobby's shoulder she was leaning against.

Hannah knew they were living together. He'd realized it months ago, and had decided to employ a "don't ask, don't tell" policy. It didn't bother him in the least; their work was as solid as ever.

Bobby and Alex shared a glance and she said, "We're retiring, Captain."

He sat up straight in his chair. "Now? Both of you?"

"We'll give the month or whatever notice is required, but yeah," Bobby said. "It's been a long ride."

"Time to get off," Alex said.

"I heard there's an opening at the 1-6," Hannah told Eames. "A Captain's pension's a little higher than a detective's."

Alex smiled and shook her head. "I gave up on that a long time ago, Captain." She put her hand on Bobby's shoulder, and he raised his hand up to meet it. "It's time," she said quietly.

"Well… okay… I'll have HR send up the paperwork. There's a lot, you know. Do you know Francine? She handles this kind of thing. She'll walk you through it, everything from getting the retirement money started to turning over your medical insurance."

Alex took her hand back and walked around the desk to give the Captain a hug. He grinned, and when she released him, Bobby was on his feet offering his hand. "Thanks, Joe," Bobby said. "Thanks for everything."

"You're a hell of a team," he replied. "We're gonna feel the loss around here, that's for sure."

* * *

"You have got to be kidding me," Alex said as Bobby pulled the car into the lot and parked.

"Why not? We're retired. It's what people do."

She looked ahead at row after row after row of 5th wheel campers. "This is nuts."

"C'mon, Alex! You like to drive." He grinned at her, and she smacked his leg before she climbed out of the car. "We'll visit every contiguous state. And Alaska," Bobby announced.

She raised an eyebrow at him. "It's a good thing I like to drive." They walked closer and climbed inside a particularly large model that was on display. "I don't even think I can reach the pedals in one of these things," Alex complained.

"So we'll get it modified," Bobby said.

"You're serious?"

He smiled and shrugged. "I thought it would be more interesting than watching the History Channel 7 days a week."

"Bobby… I think we're old. When did that happen?" She asked, turning and putting her arms around his waist.

"I never noticed," he said, and kissed her.

"Can I help you folks?" the salesman asked from the ground at the bottom of the steps.

Bobby kept hold of her hand as he turned around. "We're just looking," he explained. "How much does one of these go for?"

"That all depends on the features you want. Come on down and I'll talk you through it."

Bobby turned and gave Alex a quick look. As he let go her hand and started towards the steps, she smacked him soundly on his right back pocket. He was in mid-sentence with the salesman when he laughed. Once on the ground, they held hands as they followed the man to his office.

* * *

"It's crazy," Alex said from her side of the bed. "They cost as much as a house. We can't afford that, Bobby. What if something happens to one of us? We would have nothing to fall back on."

He turned to his side and stared at her, his eyes still glimmering with possibilities. "It would be fun, though. Admit it."

She was hesitant, and he tickled her until she cried out. "All right, all right, it would be fun!"

"Maybe we can rent one," he suggested. "Just take a trip in it, you know."

"And go where?"

"Alaska?"

"Too cold."

"California." Bobby caressed her for a moment with his hand. "We could see a lot of great places on the way."

Alex smiled. "Kind of a retirement celebration," she said.

"Or a honeymoon."

She looked at him in shock. There it was again. No matter how well she thought she knew him, he always managed to surprise her. "You want to get married? Now? Why?"

"Why not?"

She had no good answer for that. With a content smile, she ran her hand along his cheek and then kissed him. "Maybe on the way to California, we can stop in Vegas."

THE END

* * *

A/N Thanks to everyone for reading, and always for the supportive reviews! I would still love to hear from you!


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